Hits and Misses

It was a day of hits and misses. First, I was a little late getting out, and thought I'd missed the good weather, as the clouds rolled in. I literally ran part of the way out onto the farm, in case there was a thunderstorm coming. I missed the group of mallard ducks in front of me until they flew up. Missed the moose on the other side of the slough until I heard it crashing away into the bush. Missed (couldn't find)  the Cowslips/Caltha palustris and Sweet Coltsfoot/Petasites that I saw in bud a while back and hoped would be blooming (the whole reason for my rushed walk out into the slough), and couldn't find any! I saw lots of Caltha emerging, and in bud, but no open flowers. No Petasites at all, in spite of rushing through several possible sites.

Looking west on the farm before I started out.

View on the farm, prime habitat, no Petasites found

Lots of Caltha palustris in bud and glorious spring colour, no open flowers

Off the cuff snaps of Mallard ducks flying away

Off the cuff snaps of Mallard ducks flying away

Things started to look up a bit as I hurried back toward home: I realised the threatening clouds should have arrived, and when I looked up, I noticed they seemed to have split off to the north and south as they often do above us, and it was staying sunny. So I checked a couple more sites, one in an open wooded area on the acreage. No luck. Then I decided to go out onto the road, and back down toward the slough from that side. I often forget that wet roadside areas are good for early Petasites, as they often have more sun. Nothing along the ditch, then, in a grassy area in the wet pasture: bingo! I saw first one plant in bud, then more, then some with a few flowers beginning to open, then a few that could generously be described as flowering.

Further bonus, this was a really nice population with lots of red in the stem bracts, and good form and colour on the flowers. There is a  lot of variation in Petasites flowers. Like all plants in the composite or daisy/aster family, flowers are made up of disc flowers in the centre, and ray flowers around the outside (like petals, which they are not). The proportion and number of these varies in Petasites, giving very different looks. Then, there may be plants  with all male or all female flowers (either pollen or pistils to receive it) or both. Finally, flowers may be all whitish/pale or there may be significant amounts of pinkish colour. These flowers were not open enough to say much about the other characters, but there was lots of colour. Some of that colour could be due to temperature (April had been chilly) or exposure to sun: this site was recently partly cleared of willows etc, making it more open. In any event, seems like a good place to collect some material to grow in the yard.

View on the farm, some clouds, but no storm arrived

Petasites were in the wet area to the right; Looking south, the clouds have split off and mostly not come overhead

Looking north and east, looks like the worst of the weather went over there!

Overall, I'll call it a win-- first official wildflowers of the year, a nice walk just outside my yard and still time for some garden work when I got back!