I've spent an enjoyable evening looking up padre's shootingstars, which has four subspecies. I should mention that I'm starting to rely on location-based published plant lists for any particular flower ID, because I figure the folks who did the studies know a heck of a lot more than I do. Botanical descriptions and subspecies aside, these simply looked bolder and more intense than other shootingstars I've seen previously closer to home in Monterey County. Recently I read about a local seasoned botanist who distinguished species of wildflowers based on every smile. There's something to be said for familiarity and recognition, even with flowers, that is beyond words and fancy descriptors.
8 comments:
They are beautiful.
That's a nice thick bloom of them. Although I appreciate the specialists' need to classify and subclassify, and revise previous classifications to confuse people who've been out of school for a long time, I find myself drawn back once again simply to common names. :)
WE have the Shootingstar growing in our rockery in our back garden it's a lovely flower.
I love those things. When I was a kid they were my favorite wildflower... guessing by my little icon thingy, I'm thinkin' they still are, if I can possibly narrow it down to one. Are your pics from last year or this? I don't think ours are out, yet...
John, I understand your sentiments, as I sometimes pull my hair out attempting to do this blog with as specific of IDs as I dare. However, I'm learning new things by searching for more information, which is basically my goal for this occasionally, seemingly, totally useless exercise of blogging about local nature.
bb, I ALWAYS, ALWAYS post my CA nature pics to the date of my photos. Actually, we saw our first shootingstars in mid-January here on the coast: http://natureid.blogspot.com/2011/01/padres-shooting-star-dodecatheon.html
Katie, Shooting Stars are one of my fav wildflowers and they are often some of the first to appear in late winter. Our subspecies here on the Santa Rosa Plateau is D. clevelandii ssp. clevelandii. On our hike to the main vernal pool this morning we saw a patch in bloom and that just made my day. When massed like the ones in your photo though, they are a sight to behold. Btw, I will email you the line drawings of the trillium as soon as my scanner is fixed - it's been on the fritz these past couple days.
Arleen, good to know about your local shootingstar. Say, don't mess with the scanner; take a pic and send as an attachment. I don't post other's pics or illustrations, so there's no issue about copyright.
Hi Katie,
Scanner came back to life, so I've just emailed you a copy of the Trillium pages in pdf. Hopefully they are somewhat informative!
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