Mountain Plants of the Western Cascades

Posts Tagged ‘Eriophyllum’

The rock formations of Logger Butte are quite stunning, and the many colorful wildflowers growing in the rocks make it even more special.

Dave admiring the cliff on the south side of Logger Butte.

Groundhog Mountain in southeastern Lane County has been one of my favorite botanizing sites for almost 20 years (over 40 trips so far!). Unfortunately, despite many roads leading up to the numerous wetlands and rocky spots, it has been getting more difficult to get up there, so my visits have been getting less frequent. From any direction, it’s 10 miles or more of gravel roads that have been deteriorating over time, and with no trails and no real logging of late, there has been no upkeep on the roads. So I was thrilled to get invited by Dave Predeek to go up there with him and Alan Butler, who also loves the area. Both are fellow members of the Native Plant Society of Oregon. Alan has a hefty truck and doesn’t mind driving—my kind of a guy! On July 15, Alan drove us up the northern route to Groundhog via Road 2309, the road I took for many years until I finally gave up on it when a deep gully developed in the middle of the road. I was really happy to see the gully seemed to have filled in on its own, and the road wasn’t as bad as the last time I’d driven. Not to say I would take my smaller car up that way yet, but it was passable for a sturdy, high-clearance vehicle. Read the rest of this entry »

Looking down through ookow (Dichelostemma congestum) and tomcat clover (Trifolium willdenovii) at a sweep of Oregon sunshine (Eriphyllum lanatum) on the lowest cliff, June 4.

Menzies’ larkspur (Delphinium menziesii) and Oregon sunshine (Eriophyllum lanatum) on the west end of the ridge, June 18.

I mentioned in my earlier post about a trip to Eagles Rest in May (see Unusual Plants of Eagles Rest) that I was picking up farm-fresh vegetables almost every week in Dexter this summer. Because it was only about 8 more miles to Eagles Rest, the short trip up to the summit became part of my weekly ritual. I headed up there eight times altogether this spring and summer.  A great many species I was looking to add to the restoration area on my property grow there, so I was able to watch the flowering and collect seed of all of them as the season progressed. I love that this site is so short a hike and short a drive that I can be there in back in just a few hours, if that’s all the time I had, although when I was collecting seed, it sometimes took much longer than that. Here is a look back at the flowers I saw on my trips to Eagles Rest in June and July. Read the rest of this entry »

The rock garden along the ridge in all its peak-season glory: bright purple small-flowered penstemon (Penstemon procerus), pink cliff penstemon (P. rupicola), yellow western groundsel (Senecio integerrimus), and white Calochortus

These small bees seemed to be particularly interested in the abundant fern-leaved lomatium (Lomatium dissectum).

On July 6, I spent the day on Lowder Mountain. I’d heard that Road 1993 was in good shape (It’s one of the few reliably well-kept roads these days), and I hadn’t been there since I led a hike there when our Native Plant Society chapter hosted our Annual Meeting back in 2016 (see Back to Back Trips to Horsepasture and Lowder Mountains). I drove east under overcast skies but thankfully broke out into full sun on my drive up to the mountain. It was gorgeous all day until around 5pm when the clouds took over again, so I really lucked out. The flowers were beautiful, and I pretty much had the whole mountain to myself. And although I was once again disappointed by the paucity of butterflies, there were oodles of bees to keep me amused. Here are some photographic highlights. Read the rest of this entry »

So many brightly colored species clamouring for attention on the south ridge that it was hard to know where to point the camera. Here paintbrush, penstemon, lupine, Oregon sunshine, and stonecrop make it into the photo.

Once again, there weren’t as many butterflies as one would expect for all the flowers, but we did see this pale swallowtail nectaring on wallflower (Erysimum capitatum). California tortoiseshells, duskywings, and parnassians were about the only other species we saw.

Mount June was one of the first places I went hiking when I moved to Oregon (back in the ’90s!). I went at least once a year for many years. I guess there are just too many great destinations to explore these days because it had been almost six years since I’d been there and 8 years since I’d seen the area during bloom season. My last report was from 2011 (see Sawtooth Rock Meadow in Gorgeous Peak Bloom)—funny how that seems like it was just a short while ago!

I’d been wanting to show John Koenig the off-trail areas on the south and west, and he was already planning a trip there, so, for my 30th trip there, we agreed to drive up separately and do a socially distanced hike together on June 22. The pandemic has reduced my already limited social life to almost completely absent, so it was nice to be out with a good friend on such a gorgeous day.
 
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Kris checking the Lewisia key on her tablet while Betsy continues to count plants.

Betsy spotted this pair of three-leaved plants trying to trick a trio of botanists. The Columbia windflower (Anemone deltoidea) flower is trying on the western trillium (Trillium ovatum) leaves, perhaps disappointed that its similar leaves (hiding above) are much smaller.

Citizen’s Rare Plant Watch is a citizen science program that was started by the Native Plant Society of Oregon in 2012 and is now run by the Rae Selling Berry Seed Bank and Plant Conservation Program at Portland State University. Volunteers, led by Kris Freitag, travel around the state gathering information on rare plants and trying to relocate plants that have not been seen in the state in many years.

Kris contacted me a while back about monitoring the Columbia lewisia (Lewisia columbiana) John Koenig and I found last year (see Yet Another Exciting Discovery at Bristow Prairie). I suggested I join her and give her the “tour” of one of my favorite places. After several volunteers had to cancel, only Betsy Becker was able to make it all the way down from the Portland area. As it happened, Walama Restoration was hosting a campout at Sacandaga Campground that weekend, so Kris and Betsy and I joined them there on Friday night and headed up to Bristow Prairie on Saturday morning, June 22nd.

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The west end of the ridge can’t be seen from most of the ridge, but this is where most of the purple milkweed is found.

After my first look at the rocky slope north of Grassy Glade (see Exploring Near Grassy Glade), I was anxious to get back when the milkweed was in bloom (and the weather was better!). On June 11, I drove to Grassy Glade and walked directly to the end of Road 262 to where I could climb down to what I’m now calling “Rabbitbrush Ridge.” Since the thunderstorm drove me away before I was able to make it to the far end of the ridge on my earlier trip, I headed along the ridge to west end rather than poking around down the steep slope. That turned out to be the right thing to do. After finding a few individual plants scattered along the ridge, I was thrilled to come upon a decent-sized population of milkweed blooming in a scree just beyond the north-south dike I had thought marked the end of the ridge. This area was a bit more protected and more gravelly than rocky, so perhaps more to their liking. Read the rest of this entry »

The main color throughout the meadows was provided by yellow Oregon sunshine (Eriophyllum lanatum), creamy white northern buckwheat (Eriogonum compositum), and pink farewell-to-spring (Clarkia amoena), which was just beginning its showstopping display. While some areas were already dried out, others, such as here at the east end of the dike meadow, were still gorgeous.

A few harsh paintbrush (Castilleja hispida) plants were still in glorious bloom as was this plant down the slope of the first big view meadow.

On July 3, I went to Tire Mountain to look at late flowers and collect some seeds of early flowering plants. I was surprised at how much was still in bloom. I had a lovely day getting to know other wildflower-loving hikers and cavorting with butterflies and did some exploring down the steep slope of the view meadow on the north end, something I’d been meaning to do for quite some time. Along with checkerspots, acmon blues were abundant. Their host food plants are buckwheats (Eriogonum spp.), which were at peak bloom. What was surprising was how friendly they were. Not once, not twice, but three times over the course of the day, an acmon blue landed on my arm and started sipping. It sure makes it easier to get a close up photograph! Here are some of the photographic highlights. Read the rest of this entry »

In the wetland near Loletta Lakes, Juan found a nice shady spot under some willows next to an amazing display of monkey flower (I’m not sure if this is now Erythranthe guttata or not) where he could stay cool and perhaps enjoy the display.

For the second day of our NARGS annual campout (June 20), we headed up Coal Creek Road 2133 to do some roadside botanizing. We pretty much retraced the two earlier trips John Koenig and I did several weeks earlier (see Another Exciting Day in the Calapooyas and Another Exciting Day in the Calapooyas: The Sequel). One of our usual participants, Kathy Pyle, had arrived the night before accompanied as always by her cute little dogs, Juan and Paco. We were also joined for the day by Sheila Klest, the proprietor of Trillium Gardens, a local native plant nursery. Read the rest of this entry »

While John looks at plants, Jim and Peter are admiring the view from atop one of the smaller side rocks below the large pillar rock near the beginning of the trail.

It was again my turn to organize the annual camping trip for a group of Oregon members of the North American Rock Garden Society, and while it would be an obvious choice for me to pick somewhere near me in the Western Cascades, it was actually the rest of last year’s group (see NARGS Annual Campout Hike to Grizzly Peak) that came up with the idea that we should go to the Calapooya Mountains. Apparently, I’d mentioned the area often enough to pique their interest (imagine that!). Scouting for this trip and the abnormally low snow pack were the two main reasons I’ve pretty much spent the entire last two months exploring the Calapooyas. In fact, the first time I made it as far north as Linn County was just a few days ago on a trip to Tidbits.

With the blooming season as far along as it has been, I planned the trip for June 18–21, and I’m so glad I did. If we had done it this weekend, we would have roasted in this heatwave. Instead, we had beautiful weather with very pleasant temperatures. For our first day, we went up to Bristow Prairie to do the north end of the High Divide trail as far as the beautiful rock garden—the highlight of the day, not surprisingly among a group of rock plant lovers. Since some of our normal attendees weren’t able to come this year, I invited some local NPSO friends to join us for day trips. On Friday, June 19th, in addition to Robin and her dog Austin, Kelley, Peter, Christine and her husband Yaghoub, and me, we were joined by my husband, Jim, and Dave Predeek and John Koenig. It was a really good group and far more men than usual! Here are some brief highlights. Read the rest of this entry »

This section of Road 452 is a veritable smorgasbord for butterflies, bees, and other pollinators.

With the continued warm weather, I didn’t feel like exerting myself, so on Friday, August 25, I went to Groundhog Mountain, accompanied by Sabine Dutoit and Nancy Bray, to do some relaxing roadside botanizing and butterfly watching. There’s too much to see to do everything in one trip, so we started by heading up Road 452, which goes around the east and north sides of the mountain. The best butterfly area, a little less than a mile up the road, was really superb. The coyote mint (Monardella odoratissima) and Oregon sunshine (Eriophyllum lanatum) were at peak, along with lots sulphur buckwheat (Eriogonum umbellatum), leafy fleabane (Erigeron foliosus), fireweed (Chamerion angustifolium), and skyrocket (Ipomopsis aggregata). What a sight. There were oodles of butterflies including pale swallowtails, hydaspe fritillaries, variable checkerspots, Anna’s blues, pine whites, parnassians, a tiger swallowtail, one painted lady—possibly my first of the season, a woodland skipper, a mylitta crescent, a Lorquin’s admiral, and several coppers, including a purplish. Read the rest of this entry »