Dispatch from the Butterfly Ranch

From our walk yesterday there is this - one of the first species to make an appearance in very large quantities. 

click on images for a closer look

Acres and acres of this blooming beauty - smooth penstemon - Penstemon digitalis. 

This flower materializes quite suddenly (seemingly out of nowhere) during late spring or early summer for about a month and then it’s gone.  A showy member of the snapdragon family and native to the prairie it is commonly called beardtongue or foxglove. 

Native Americans and folk-healers have made use of this plant for medicinal purposes for both people and animals.  Long-tongued bees, including honeybees, bumblebees, miner bees, butterflies, Sphinx moths, and hummingbirds favor this plant.  The name beardtongue is a consequence of the hairy reproductive parts found within the flower.     



We also found a handful of false sunflower (Ox-Eye) - Heliopsis helianthoides – that are beginning to come on-line. 

And along the wetter conditions bordering the banks of Silver Creek we found some Iris versicolor - sometimes called the northern Iris or blue flag iris – growing in clumps or patches.  Iris derives from the Greek word for rainbow.  Which is appropriate considering the wide variation of colors that wild iris displays.







Last but not least - I started my day with coffee on the porch with one of my monarch buddies. 

The monarch's host plant is common milkweed - Asclepias syriaca - and is just now beginning to bloom....