Even More Early Blooms

From one of our daily walks we found this......  
 

click on image to enlarge

 

A member of the mustard family of plants this is Barbarea vulgaris - commonly known as Winter Cress. 

This is one of the earliest plants to bloom in the spring.  As its name implies - you can find it poking thru the snow remaining on the ground.  There's no snow anymore around these parts and this is blooming-up a storm in the dappled sunlit locations near the banks of Silver Creek. It happens to be a non-native biennial plant and because it emerges early in the growing season is an early and welcome source of fodder for the local deer herd.

If you fashion yourself a healer and are into folk medicine this plant has been used by early settlers as a poultice to treat wounds from farm and hunting accidents.

The tiny black seeds of this flower are exceedingly hot and also make a natural pepper substitute.