Mountain Plants of the Western Cascades

Posts Tagged ‘Parnassia’

My favorite part of the bog was a small section of windy creeks and pools along the northern edge. It reminded me a lot of the bog near Lopez Lake that John Koenig and I call Zen Meadow. The white flowers are grass-of-Parnassus

This sphinx moth caterpillar was hanging out on a twinberry (Lonicera involucrata) leaf.

Between finalizing Volume 2 of the Flora of Oregon (see previous post), hot summer weather, and fairly mundane trips to lower elevation sites to collect seeds, I didn’t get a lot of exploring done in August (and being on evacuation alert and smoke during the Holiday Farm fire pretty much nixed any hiking in September). But after finding the wonderful bog on Warner Mountain (see Back to Warner Mountain Bog), I did get the urge to look for new sites to botanize.

I had been planning to go back to Blair Lake to collect some seed anyway, so I took a closer look at the surrounding area on Google Earth before my trip. I noticed several areas that looked like they could be interesting wetlands that weren’t far off roads and could be combined with a trip to Blair. So, on August 9, I headed up to Blair, but when I came to the intersection of Road 733, instead of turning right to follow the sign up to Blair Lake, I stayed on Road 1934 and parked one mile farther up. Heading into the woods on the right (east), it was only about 1/8 of a mile to the wetland, although with tromping over fallen logs and such, it took 15 minutes or so (see Google Map image). Read the rest of this entry »

Gentians blooming in the main bog.

Alpine laurel (Kalmia microphylla) is already in seed by the time the flowers of the late-blooming gentians appear.

Having just discovered explorer’s gentians (Gentiana calycosa) on Warner Mountain (see previous post, Hidden Bog on Warner Mountain), my top priority was to get back to see them in full bloom. I contacted Molly Juillerat, botanist and Middle Fork District ranger, to see if she wanted to come. Luckily, she was free the following weekend. I figured that was enough time for the display to be worth the trip. As it turns out, a couple of other friends, Nancy and Keiko, were already planning to head up to that area as well. So we agreed to all drive up separately and meet by the lookout on August 2. Keiko brought her husband, Daniel, and Molly brought her faithful dog, Ruby. After checking out an interesting rocky spot a short way off the road that I’d noticed on Google Earth (not too many flowers but pikas under the rock pile!), we stopped to have lunch by the lookout. Sadly, the Cascade lilies were pretty much done—I was really fortunate to have seen them the week before. Then we headed over to the bog. Read the rest of this entry »

Giant Alaska cedars (Callitropsis nootkatensis) are one of the highlights of this trail. This ancient tree is at least 5′ in diameter!

On August 17, Sabine Dutoit and John Koenig joined me for a trip to Echo Basin. I hadn’t been there in 6 years (see Late Bloomers at Echo Basin & Ikenick Creek), and it was another site that John had never been to. It’s a great late summer destination as there are lots of late-blooming flowers, and it stays cool and damp later than many other areas, especially those to the south in Lane County where I spend the majority of my time. It was also nice to take a break from all the bushwhacking and walk on a trail for once, although, on the way back, Sabine commented that all the downed trees across the trail in one area made it only slightly easier than a bushwhack. Since it is a relatively short hike, we took our time getting there, stopping to look at rock ferns (Asplenium trichomanes, Woodsia scopulina, Cheilanthes gracillima, and Cryptogramma acrostichoides) growing in the lava areas along Hwy 126, and to Fish Lake to eat lunch and check out some sedges and asters that John and I had seen as the sun was setting on our way home from Pigeon Prairie the previous week.

On our way to Echo Basin, we stopped at Fish Lake to admire a show of western asters in the now dried out lake bed. While I didn’t recognize it at the time, the view in the distance is of Echo Peak and the ridge just above Echo Basin.

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Cascade grass-of-Parnassus (Parnassia cirrata var. intermedia) is one of my favorite wildflowers and a wonderful bonus this late in the season.

Ever since our early June trip to the meadow along Road 3810 on the south side of Loletta Peak (see Another Exciting Day in the Calapooyas: The Sequel), John Koenig and I had been planning to return to see the later blooming plants, especially the Cascade fringed grass-of-Parnassus (Parnassia cirrata) that we found there. Just before we had planned to go, Ed Alverson e-mailed me about the quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides) we had discovered there. He’s been studying the scattered populations on the west side of the Cascades in Oregon and Washington. The timing was perfect, as we were able to take Ed along on August 12 to see the population in what we were now calling “Aspen Meadow.” We had been somewhat concerned with all the fires down in Douglas County, especially the Potter Mountain complex burning just east of Balm Mountain (thankfully not actually on Potter Mountain). But other than some drifting smoke above, we had no problems reaching our destination and enjoying what was an otherwise lovely day. Read the rest of this entry »

Sliver Rock is an awesome pillar rock that protrudes from the slope below Road 3810 in the Boulder Creek Wilderness. There seems to be a lot of confusion about the name. The USGS quad map shows it as “Sliver Rock,” but their website lists it as “Silver Rock”. The Forest Service District maps that cover the area are also divided about the name. I’m going to keep calling it Sliver Rock because it really is like a thin sliver, and there’s nothing silvery about it. John and I contemplated how and whether we might be able to reach the rock. It looks challenging but too enticing not to give it a try…some day.

John Koenig and I had such a great day last week (see Another Exciting Day in the Calapooyas) that we wanted to pick up where we left off, so, on Thursday, June 4, we headed back up Coal Creek Road 2133 to our usual parking spot east of Loletta Lakes. We hadn’t gotten this far last week until 6pm, so we wanted to spend more time here and see the area in the sun. When we arrived, the area was under a cloud that obscured the ridge just above us. John was confident it would burn off, and indeed, within just a few minutes, we were under blue skies. The rest of the day was gorgeous, sunny, and pleasantly cool. Read the rest of this entry »

Lorquin’s admirals (Limenitis lorquini) tend to land on branches of shrubs and small trees, repeatedly returning to the same area. This makes photographing them easier than those that skip quickly from flower to flower.

On Thursday, August 7, Sabine and I headed up to Groundhog Mountain, accompanied by fellow North American Butterfly Association member Lori Humphreys. With the majority of the flowers on the wane, we had already figured we’d probably focus on butterflies, so it was great that Lori could come and help teach me some more about some of the tough groups like fritilliaries. She also looked a lot at the skippers, but I’m still not ready to put a lot of effort into the butterfly equivalent of LBJs (little brown jobs). Here are some photographic highlights of another lovely day on Groundhog. Read the rest of this entry »

I’d been looking forward to going to the Rogue-Umpqua Divide all year, but I just couldn’t seem to squeeze a camping trip down there into my schedule earlier in the summer. Then, in late July, the Whiskey Complex fire erupted east of Tiller, just 9 miles west of Donegan Prairie, one of my planned destinations. So much for that. But last week I was lying awake in the middle of the night, my mind wandering all over the place as it often does in the wee hours, and I thought, to hell with worrying about the smoke, I’ll just go to the north end of the Rogue-Umpqua Divide. Fish Creek Valley is one of my favorite places, and there are lots of late-blooming flowers to make a trip in August worthwhile. Unlike many ideas born in the middle of the night, this one still seemed realistic in the morning, so a couple of days later, I packed up my van and headed south.

Rattlesnake Mountain looms right above Fish Creek Valley. The smoke in the air makes it seem much farther away.

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It’s been another great year for beargrass (Xerophyllum tenax). It’s blooming en masse here in the upper wetland at Hemlock Butte. Diamond Peak seems to be just a stone’s throw away.

On Friday, August 3, Molly Juillerat and I will be leading a field trip to Warfield Bog and Hemlock Butte wetlands east of Oakridge (for more info or to sign up, call the Middle Fork Ranger Station at 541-782-2283). To make sure the roads are okay and to see what might be blooming, I went for a scouting trip on Sunday (July 21). On the drive up, I was very pleased to score some ripe seeds of silver lupine (Lupinus albifrons), one of my favorite rock plants for its gorgeous silvery foliage. Lupines are very hard to collect seed from on the fly. Their seed pods explode almost as soon as they are ripe, vaulting the seeds away from the plant. The best way to collect is to put some sort of a bag over the ripening pods to catch the seeds. This is great for a monitored site, but for a random stop along the road, I just had to get lucky. Many of the pods had released their seeds and were all coiled up. Some pods were starting to turn brown but hadn’t opened up yet. I lazily threw them on the seat of the car, planning to put them in a seed envelope later. When I returned to the car to eat lunch after my first foray at Warfield Bog, they had exploded from the heat in the car, I suppose, and had scattered seeds all over the place. A bit of a mess, perhaps, but more seeds than I’ve ever managed to get before, so I was happy. My most recent plant in the garden died after the March snowstorm this spring, so I need to get some more started. Read the rest of this entry »

Happy 2011! The latest Oregon Flora Newsletter just arrived, and I was pleased to see the Oregon Flora Project is ready to adopt the latest family classifications from the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group (APG). “What is the APG?,” you may be wondering. When I first started pestering the professional botanists around me with questions about who decides what the proper botanical name for a plant is, I was surprised that there didn’t seem to be some governing body making those kinds of decisions. An individual could do research on a plant, decide it should be reclassified, and it was up to others whether they felt the research warranted adopting this new name or classification. So botanical names could be almost as localized as common names.

Fringed grass-of Parnassus (Parnassia fimbriata) is now considered to be a member of Celastraceae. We’ll have to wait and see if it stays there as it has proven a difficult genus to classify.

According to the Wikipedia article, “The Angiosperm Phylogeny Group, or APG, refers to an informal international group of systematic botanists who came together to try to establish a consensus view of the taxonomy of flowering plants (angiosperms) that would reflect new knowledge about their relationships based upon phylogenetic studies.” At last, a single source for plant classification! It seems that most plant authorities are now following the APG classifications, so we can expect more consensus in the future. With all the new genetic-based research bringing so much new information to light, it is a relief to have some central body overseeing classification. Read the rest of this entry »

Vines maples turning red between Iron Mountain and Cone Peak

It was a gorgeous day on Monday (September 27), and a great day to be in the mountains even if most of the flowering is over. In all the times I’d been to Iron Mountain and Cone Peak, I realized I’d never been there in late summer or early fall, so that was our destination. Like most people in western Oregon, Iron Mountain was the first place I’d heard of when asking where to go see flowers. So I went a number of times after I moved here in the early ’90s. But, eventually, I discovered how many other terrific botanical areas there are in the Cascades—and how much more peaceful they are without the summer crowds that seem to make the pilgrimage to Iron Mountain as though it is the only beautiful spot in the mountains. I still love to go up to Cone Peak as the snow is melting, but I’ve kind of ignored Iron Mountain for quite some time. There were many late-blooming plants listed for the area that I’d never seen there, so I was long overdue for a visit. Read the rest of this entry »