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| Flowering Dogwood, Cornus florida, shines against a clear spring blue sky. |
Part II of our look at some mid-season spring wildflowers on the Preserve starts with a buttercup. The buttercup family, Ranunculaceae, is pretty large. On the Preserve there are about 25 different species of plants from this family. The one in question is Hispid Buttercup, Ranuculus hispidus.
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| This Hispid Buttercup, Ranuculus hispida, had attracted a small fly. |
Flowers in this genus are often yellow and shiny. This particular one is growing in great carpets in a flood plane near Ohio Brush Creek. It makes for a beautiful display of cheery golden yellow and happy spring green colors.
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| This floodplane is carpeted with large amounts of Hispid Buttercup. |
Staying in the color yellow, next up is Celandine-poppy. Now before you get excited, let's review all the yellow-colored plants that have celandine in their name and figure out who is who.
Greater Celandine, Chelidonium majus, member of the Poppy family, non-native and listed as a noxious weed in several states.
Lesser Celandine, Ficaria verna, member of the Buttercup family, non-native and listed as a noxious weed in several states.
Celandine-poppy, Stylophorum diphyllum, member of the Poppy family, native and found on moist soils in several Midwestern states.
It is the last one of which we're going to talk about. Here it is.
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| This Celandine-poppy, Stylophorum diphyllum, is opening back up after a rainstorm and is sporting a fuzzy seed pod. |
Very pretty. This spring ephemeral has large, four petaled flowers and two leaves up on the stem. Those leaves are deeply divided and have fairly large teeth along each lobe. When it grows along side the pure white of Large-flowered Trillium, its creates quite a display. Also of interest are the very fuzzy buds and very fuzzy seed pods. Both of the celandines from the Poppy family have long histories of medicinal uses, and due to the bright yellow sap found in the plant was used as a yellow dye in the past.
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| A brand new golden bloom is about to burst out of its fuzzy bud coverings. |
Here is one of the rare plants found on the Preserve, False Garlic, Nothoscordum Bivalve. It's listed as a threatened plant in Ohio. A look at the range map of this plant shows that we are at the northeastern end of its range. It can be found quite commonly in the southeast US and in places such as Missouri and Texas. False Garlic has slender, grass-like leaves and dainty clusters of white flowers at the end of the flower stalk. Along some of the roads within the Preserve, it can grow quite profusely, sometimes by itself or mixed in with other flowers like Dwarf Larkspur, Wild Blue Phlox, Wild Ginger and Toad Trillium.
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| False Garlic, Nothoscordum bivalve, opens in bight sunlight awaiting any number of bee visitors. |
As the name implies, there is no onion-y or garlic scent to this plant. It does not appear to be edible to humans but does play a role in the lives of several kinds of bees. If fact, there is a particualr bee that only visits False Garlic. Bees that limit their foraging behaviors to one or a few related plants are called oligolectic bees. You can read more about them here.
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| Everything about False Garlic seems ling and slender. It's leavers, petals, stamens and general appearance. |
Here is another rare plant on the Preserve, again due to being on the edge of its range. This gem is Nodding Mandarin, Prosartes maculata. It's very captivating as the leaves tend to have an upward lift to them while the flowers hang below like bells. Another common name for this plant is Fairy Bells!
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| Fairies or not, this beetle sure seems to be enjoying itself! |
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| Nodding Mandarin, Prosates maculata, got its specific epithet from the lovely purple spots decorating the six petals. |
Last for our very brief look at mid-season wildflowers is one of the many, many violets. I enjoy this one as it is pretty common, stays in bloom for a long time, and has somehow wrapped up all the best springtime colors into one gorgeous plant. This is Canda Violet, Viola canadensis, one of about a dozen different violets on the preserve. While violets in general are very easy to recognize, they are notorious for being difficult to separate into individual species.
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| Canada Violet, Viola canadensis, is a larger (for a violet) fairly easy to recognize native violet. |
Canada Violet thankfully has a couple of things that make it a little easier to ID. So first off, it's white. There are other white violets, but this one is a pure white and actually quite large for a violet. The other characteristic which separates it out from its cousins is on the back of the upper two petals. There will be a wash of purple which can range in intensity from very light to quite dark.
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| The wash of purple on the back of the upper two petals helps to make a positive ID of Canada Violet. |
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| This bee is fully committed to scoring that sweet, nectar-y reward. |
Like most flowering plants with large, showy flowers, this violet depends in part on insects, like bees, to pollinate it. Placement of nectar within the flower can help position potential pollinators just right. Maybe that is what's happening here.
This was just a small taste of all the great flowers that make their appearance as the spring season rolls on. We are fortunate that the prolonged cool weather has kept things blooming for longer than they might under warmer conditions. It's not too late to find some great mid-season wildflowers blooming wherever you are!
Posted by: Robyn Wright-Strauss
