First Flower Chasing of 2024

March 23, 2024

Author: Phyllis Root
Photographer: Kelly Povo

After a year of thirty thousand words, 275 photos, and 6,000 miles crisscrossing the state, we have finally finished a working draft of our next (as yet untitled) wildflower book! So what do we do to celebrate?

What else but go flower chasing?

It’s been a chancy spring after an almost snow-free winter. Snow had finally fallen on our first free weekend from working on the book, but we couldn’t resist the urge to be outside and looking for wildflowers . We’d heard about a hillside covered in snow trillium south of the cities, and even though we’ve seen snow trilliums, a flower of state special concern, in several places over the years, we are always excited to see old flower friends in new places.

The snow had mostly disappeared as we drove south, but the day was cold, and the ground on the hillside felt frozen underfoot. Still, poking up through last year’s oak leaves were undaunted trios of trillium leaves, a few plants with buds almost ready to open, others with buds smaller than a grain of rice, some with no buds at all yet. Scattered among the trilliums were tiny, reddish false rue anemone leaves and the purplish-red leaves of last year’s hepatica along with a few, very small, unfolding fronds of Dutchman’s breeches. Ephemeral or not, the early wildflowers were already hard at work.

Not far away at Kasota Prairie Preserve pasqueflowers were still blooming, so we headed over to see them, too. Some were past prime, others still a pale lavender, and a few were barely buds, all furry with soft hairs to help hold in heat. Pasqueflowers are clearly sun lovers: on cloudy days their blossoms stay closed, and on sunny days they follow the sun, a slow dance called heliotropism which helps the flowers trap the sun’s heat. Early queen bees flying from warm flower to warm flower gather pollen and warmth at the same time.

One last stop at Ottawa Bluffs Nature Conservancy site took us up a hill topped with burr oaks, past more pasqueflowers than a person could count to a panoramic view over the river valley.

We are always delighted by these first flowers and the promise of more to follow. Most of all we are delighted to be out and about again, chasing wildflowers wherever we can find them.