Saturday, June 22, 2013

Apex Park in June

Thursday night, I ran at Apex Park near Golden, Colorado for the first time this year. On odd numbered days, mountain bikers can only go one way on some of the Apex trails. Thursday was an even day so there was a lot of bike traffic. My favorite trail at Apex is Enchanted Forest because I love wooded trails. They are so peaceful! I have been taking my new Garmin GPS watch on my trail runs this summer and finally signed up on Garmin Connect so I can upload my runs and see the map, elevation gain, etc. I am not concerned about speed on my trail runs because of the elevation gains. I did find it interesting that I spent 15 minutes of this run not moving. Do I really stop that much to take pictures?



One of the things that I like about Apex is that I can pretty much count on seeing deer next to the trail. This week I only saw one - you can barely see it in my photo.



I was a little bit disappointed in the wildflowers that I saw this week, though I shouldn't have been. This was a week for Lupine to shine; last week it was Beardtongue. The wild pink roses were really pretty. I also saw Cranesbill geraniums, Toadflax and Dwarf Golden Asters. The asters seem to thrive in these dry rocky areas.

Lupine

Dwarf Golden Asters

Lupine and Toadflax



Lupine flowers are usually purple in color but this week I spotted a white one. I also saw one of the few red wildflowers I have ever photographed, a controlled weed called Houndstongue.  Jefferson County Parks has a list of noxious weeds on their website, which includes flowers that I didn't know were on the controlled list - like Toadflax.

White Lupine
This week, I also managed to see something new. The white flower below is one I couldn't find on any of my favorite Colorado wildflower websites but the leaves sure look like a Meadow or Canada Anemone.

Meadow Anemone
I also found the Colorado State Flower, Columbine on the Enchanted Forest trail. Even though this is the state flower, I don't see a lot of them in the foothills. I think it is too dry and hot.



Fifteen minutes of not moving according to my GPS = 15 pictures of wildflowers/wildlife (8 shared on this post) plus a rested heart!

Saturday, June 15, 2013

Mount Falcon in June

This week I returned to Mount Falcon Park near Morrison, Colorado for a trail run. I ran from the east trailhead up Turkey Trot to the Castle Trail then up to the picnic shelter. I continued on Castle Trail for another mile so I could enjoy the meadow views and stretch my run to 7.5 miles total. Even though I ran this trail on the morning of Memorial Day, this evening run was memorable for several reasons. The purple Penstemons and yellow Arnica wildflowers were abundant, it rained just enough to cool things off, and the strange clicking sound of insects had me stopping a few times to see if I could see them in the shrubs. I also learned that I shouldn't be so quick about stopping to take pictures of wildflowers when I smell something stinky next to trail.

The picture below is a portion of the Walker home ruins. I am grateful that John Brisben Walker made this open space available to the public. The area is so beautiful, I can see why Walker chose to build a home there and why he dreamed of having a summer White House in this area.



Scattered along the lower elevations of Turkey Trot, I saw clumps of pretty pinkish purple flowers. When I searched for the name of this flower I had some trouble finding a photo until I visited the Kansas Wildflower website for the first time. This site lists wildflowers by color and flowering time; one of the Colorado Wildflower sites I use was patterned off of it.

Purple Locoweed
At the lower elevations I took a better picture of Copper Mallow than I took on one of my earlier runs. Pricklypear cactus were starting to bloom this week. There were several white flower stalks, Miners Candleflowers, along the hillsides. I caught a glimpse of a light yellow flower that I had photographed last year but been unable to name. I was thrilled to finally find the name of this flower, Ten-Petal Mentzelia, on the Kansas Wildflower site after searching fruitlessly on my Colorado links. According to the site, this flower grows on dry, rocky hillsides and slopes and is also known as Chalk Lily and Evening Starflower.

Copper Mallow

Pricklypear Cactus

Miners Candleflower

Ten-Petal Mentzelia
The flower that I stopped to photograph shortly after getting a whiff of what smelled like a dead animal was Bellflower. Imagine my shock when I saw a dead fox right next to the trail! My photo of the Bellflower is blurry so I will try to get a better one the next time. 


Penstemons
I have been keeping an eye out for new wildflowers. I have been rewarded by seeing a couple of flowers in only one place on the trail that I wouldn't have noticed if I wasn't paying attention to my surroundings - the blanket flower on a hillside next to the trail and a tiny white Mariposa Lily all by itself next to the trail. I also saw Cow Parsnip in an unexpected spot.

Blanket Flower

Mariposa Lily


Hawksbeard (Crepis)


Puccoon


Saturday, June 8, 2013

Favorite Wildflower Links

I will update this page with the websites I used most frequently to search for wildflower names.


Favorite Wildflower Links:
Wildflowers of Colorado: This site features the wildlife photography of Dr. Mary L Dubler, DVM from Fort Collins, Colorado. She organizes her photos by color and has quite an impressive collection.

Colorado Wildflowers: This site features photos organized by color. One of the things I like about this site is that the photographer noted the hike where the photos were taken. She has hiked on the same trails as me, however she doesn't appear to have updated her photos for a few years.

Eastern Colorado Wildflowers: This site features a long list of common flower names. You can search for flowers by color, zone (plains, foothills, alpine, etc) and month. Lots of flowers!

Southwest Wildflowers of Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Utah: This site has flowers from the Four Corner states grouped by color and plant family.

Root Cellar: This site lists weeds and wildflowers by growing area - high mountain gardens, foothills, roadsides and ditches, marshes and meadows, and rocks and sand. It also has links for places in Utah.

Kansas Wildflower: This site has Kansas wildflowers and grasses listed by color and flowering time. The site has an extensive list of flowers and is easy to search for flowers by common or scientific name.

Wildflowers West: Photos are organized by color. Each color has a photo index link where you can quickly scroll through all of the flowers of that color.

Colorado Wildflowers - Deer Creek in June

Red Mesa Trail
Rocky Section of Red Mesa Trail

This week, the first week of June 2013, I returned to Deer Creek Canyon Park in the Rocky Mountain foothills for a 7.75 mile trail run. My husband and I arrived at the trailhead earlier than normal because I wanted to run the Red Mesa loop. The wildflowers were gorgeous, especially the purple Beardtongue, yellow Arnica, and yellow Banner. There weren't very many mountain bikers on the trail this week but there were a lot of hikers and runners. Someone said that some of the runners were from a Boulder running club.

My wildflower obsession has me stopping frequently on the trail when I see a flower that I haven't seen yet this year or if I just want a closer look because I'm trying to figure out what something is. That may make me a bad running partner but my husband was patient and even seems to notice flowers more than he used to! The women I run with appreciate wildflowers too and they don't seem to mind my stopping when I run with them.

The Red Mesa trail is a forested trail that has some steep rocky sections as you can see from the photo. There are a lot of rocky uphill sections at Deer Creek so you can see why I would stop often.

I have photographed many of the same kinds of flowers the past few years - Indian Paintbrush, Beardtongue, Chiming Bells, etc. I am discovering though that the more I learn about wildflowers, the more curious I am about the ones that I don't know by now. And yes, I am becoming a bit obsessive about documenting the flowers I see. I am learning that I have to do a better job of focusing the camera on my close-ups. I'm getting a few blurry photos every week. The flower below was an orange flower that I saw in the weeds near the trail head and in only one other place on the trail. I rarely see reds and oranges so a clear photo would have been nice. Based on Doctor Dubler's photo collection, I think this is a Copper Mallow, also known as Cowboy's Delight.

Copper Mallow
White Flowers
Colorado is a semi arid state so I often see pricklypear cactus and Yucca plants on the trails in the foothills. This week, I saw a Yucca plant with blooms that were open. I got close to it and saw that it was covered with small insects. I also saw some Canada Violets in a more forested area. (See my May Mount Falcon post for a picture of Yellow Violets). I don't know what this spiky looking white flower is; I only saw it once. I took a couple of other photos of white flowers that I am not familiar with but my picture quality was poor.

Yucca

Canada Violet
Yellow Flowers


I am trying not to be too repetitive in posting photos of flowers this summer but the Yellow Banner flowers were really incredible this week. I also saw some flowers that resemble Sedum (Stonecrop). When I moved to my house, Stonecrop was growing in the rock border of our back yard. The Toadflax and Sulfur flower were more prevalent in the lower elevations of the hiker only Meadowlark trail. The Foothills Arnica has blooms that are similar to the Heartleaf Arnica I saw last week at Lair o' the Bear.

Sedum (Stonecrop)

Yellow Banner
Sulphur Flower


Toadflax


Foothills Arnica

Purple Flowers

I only saw one Lupine plant on this run; last year I first saw them in May. At Mount Falcon on Memorial Day, I saw my first Beardtongue of the year. This week on the Red Mesa trail, I saw a few different types. According to the Southwest Colorado wildflowers site, there are more than 250 species of Penstemons in North America. It also says that Penstemons are part of the Snapdragon family, one of my favorite flowers. On my way back down Plymouth Trail, which runs next to a creek, a flower close to the water caught my eye - the flower below that has a bit of yellow on it. I don't know what it is but perhaps it is a Johnny Jump-Up. (Update: Dr. Dubler's Colorado Wildflowers page on Facebook has a similar picture of a Shooting Star).

Lupine
Penstemon

Penstemon

Shooting Star

Monday, June 3, 2013

Colorado Wildflowers - Lair o' the Bear in May

My last trail run in May began at Jefferson County's Lair o' the Bear Park near Morrison, Colorado. I say my run began there because after a mile or so the Bear Creek Trail crosses into Corwina Park, which is part of the Denver Mountain Parks open space. The Lair o' the Bear part of the trail is a fairly flat gravel trail alongside the creek. After the trail crosses into Corwina Park it becomes more steep and rocky.

I saw chiming bells, wild delphiniums, and mouse ear on this run though not as many as on some of the other trails. The first part of the trail from the Lair o' the Bear trail head is the Creekside Trail. There are shrubs along the trail including the white one below. I saw another shrub with some bell shaped blooms but the breeze was blowing so hard that day that I didn't get a good picture of it. There were also a lot of weeds called Spurge along the Creekside Trail. 



Spurge (noxious weed)
The yellow wildflower below is one that I had not seen yet in May; I believe that this is a Heartleaf Arnica. I remember seeing some pretty yellow flowers like this on a forested trail in the mountains a few years ago after an especially wet winter.
Heartleaf Arnica
On Memorial Day at Mount Falcon, I saw purple flowers like the one below. This bell-like flower is called Sugar Bowl. It is also known as Hairy Clematis and Leather Flower. There were several Sugar Bowls on the the Bear Creek Trail, growing singly rather than in clumps.

Sugar Bowl
One of the yellow flowers that I saw at Mount Falcon on Memorial Day was a flower that I initially thought was Whiskbroom Parsley, however, I now know that there is a similar flower called Mountain Parsley. Whiskbroom is a cooler name. Evidently, Whiskbroom has stiffer leaves. I have not yet become that observant in my wildflower viewing!

Mountain Parsley