Wednesday, June 30, 2010

More Wildflowers

I took a pretty deep cut at the lawn yesterday, since, although I love letting the lawn turn into a jungle just to see what grows, I want to be able to get close enough to the blueberry bushes to pick blueberries.  I hope to have people over to pick blueberries this year, and I think they'll appreciate not having to bushwack to the blueberry bushes.  Don't worry Melanie - there'll be plenty left for you to sell!

I saw a bunch of new-to-me flowers from the seat of the mower and went back this morning to take pictures of those I didn't cut down.  I have no idea what most of these are, so I'll post now and edit this post as I identify them.

This red thing is in the jungle in front of the house.  Woodswalker, who writes the blog Saratoga Woods and Waterways has something like it in her garden, which is how I think this might be bergamot.

Newcomb's leads me to believe that the below is Hop Clover.

Last year I thought this rose was multiflora rose, but this year I know it's not.  For starters, it doesn't have many flowers as the "multiflora" name would suggest.  After the logger and his friend finish rebuilding my woodshed, I may dig up some of this and put it over by the woodshed.
The pink flowers of the below remind me of yarrow, but the leaves are different.
Now that I know what the Spreading Dogbane is, I can see that it's ... spreading.  All over the area north of the house.  It worries me, so I mowed a bunch of it down.  Not to worry that I'll kill it all though, here's some right next to some ripe raspberries. (The raspberries, of course, are blocking a blueberry bush.  Hm, the dilemma.)
The lovage is growing in cracks near the front of my house.  It's getting ready to bloom. [edit:  Ellen thought this may be Cow Parsnip, but that has white flowers and lobed leaves.  This has divided leaves and surprise, surprise, I think it IS flowering now and this is what it looks like when it's flowering.]
Below is some mysterious thing.  I hope it's not poisonous to goats because Coco likes it. [edit: it is a dock, I think it's Curled Dock. Thanks Ellen!]

And lastly (for today, anyway), the elderflowers are just approaching their peak. I didn't get my act together early enough to research things one can do with elderflower, so they'll just have to make berries and I'll pick them then. 

4 comments:

  1. You got the bee balm and the hop clover right. I wonder if your lovage, though, isn't actually cow parsnip, which grows all over, is rather invasive, and has hazardous sap - causes rashes and photosensitivity. Your mystery plant that the goats love might be dock - I don't have my field guide with me, but that's what first comes to mind.

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  2. What a wealth of wildflowers you have! And, thank you in advance for clearing a path to the blueberries!

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  3. I love that the discovery continues as far as ID'ing stuff on your property goes. Thanks for sharing.

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  4. I just saw something yesterday that looked like the cow-parsnip-type thing that was an Erigonium. I think that's how it's spelled - it's a Buckwheat.

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