01/28/2024 grasslands field trip

Mom stands on the edge of overgrazed grass at edge of bare winter woods
Mutual photography of bloggers.
Zoomed out view
A cute little seedling at just the seed leaves stage, near the dew covered spiderweb.
Briar turns to face the photographer against a backdrop of winter oaks
Who me?
After turning around in the previous picture, briar majestically lifts her head in the bright winter sunlight
Briar can pretend to be majestic and noble!
A prairie verbena purpled leaves for winter but still alive.
Last year’s branches of queen’s delight (Stillingia), the limestone species.
Briar sat nearby as Mom tried to get a picture of the Stillingia stems too.

Dixon Water Foundation morning

Bladderpod with small native bee
For someone who is probably growing this fellow’s relative, I sure have a hard time identifying cacti. I believe it’s Coryphantha sulcata based on having one central spine per areole. Here’s my baby.
Mom looks at photos she is taking.
Mom takes more photos.
It’s a magnificent creek!
Bubbles on moss.
Neat rocks the creek goes through.
A mournful thyris moth. We saw more in redbud flowers. I think it may have been getting water here, because if you zoom in you can see its proboscis out.
A cricket frog!
Another big view. You can see a redbud in the woods.
Englemann daisies growing above the creek! They’re much smaller than the ones in my garden. Presumably less water.
A white bush honeysuckle (a native one, Lonicera albiflora) branches over the creek.
This is probably a hawthorn shrub. Thanks to Abby for the suggestion that helped me look it up! There seem to be a lot of very similar species.
Here’s the probably-hawthorn trunk.
This seems familiar.
Ah ha!  A Missouri fluttermill primrose!  Note the red speckled and sort of square long flower bud.
An old seed pod at the base of the primrose plant. The leaves are much less red than the ones in my garden.
Ceanothus herbaceus, redroot or New Jersey tea.
Here are the leaves. I am growing its relative C. americanus (also called New Jersey tea) in my garden, from seeds bought from prairiemoon.com.
Blue flax!  It’s probably Linum pratense, which is an annual.  Apparently it does intergrade with the perennial Linum lewisii which is what I planted in my yard.
This flax hasn’t bloomed but you can see the leaves are very like the L. lewsii ones in my yard.
Another Englemann daisy demonstrates how adaptable this species is, growing up on the barrens away from the creek.
Just to the left, just below the middle of this picture is another fluttermill.
Cymopterus, a very early blooming wildflower, starts to go to seed.
I think this must be a much younger fluttermill Missouri primrose that has already bloomed.
This is prairie burnet.  I’d never noticed it before.  Thanks to Abby for the identification!
Yellow star grass (not actually a grass).
Another fluttermill primrose, this time in a big beautiful mound.
The face of abandonment.
Another dog who didn’t get to go.