OT: other plants
From: Dennis Kramb <dkramb@tso.cin.ix.net>
I went on my first iris hunting expedition yesterday to a nearby state
park. I knew my chances were slim to none of finding irises (too early to
be in bloom), but I found oodles of other cool wildflowers. With my handy
field guide "Wildflowers of Ohio" I was able to identify over 90% of what I
found. Much to my amazement, nearly half were species introduced from
Europe. The forest floors were covered with Dutchman's Breeches in full
bloom, Phlox, Cut-Leafed Toothwort, and even some red trilliums. I also
found some wild roses the hard way if you know what I mean (ouch!). I
won't tell you where they snagged me...it would be impolite! And I kept
finding huges patches of these odd multi-colored splotched green/dark
green/light green oval shaped leaves. Finally I remembered reading about a
"fawn lily" and a "trout lily" which had splotchy-colored leaves and sure
enough, I checked my field guide and what I found was colonies of
Erythroniums not yet in bloom. Oh, and all the Mayapples were just
emerging from the ground. What a sight! OH! And lots of violas...purple
& yellow ones. Very cool indeed.
In unrelated news, my iris cristatas that I got from Foxbrook last year are
increasing like gang-busters. I got the "alba" form, which I thought
someone here had told me was a slow increaser. But each individual rz last
year is now a clump of 3 to 7 rzs this year. Is that a normal rate??
Seems like it would be to me, but I have not grown these before. I don't
detect any buds on them, but it might still be too early to expect that
sort of thing.
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