Friday, May 13, 2022

Spring Wildflowers, Part 2

It's the Trilliums we all look forward to here in Ontario, but they're actually among the last of the spring wildflowers to bloom here.  I doubt they'll be putting on their best display yet, but the way the weather is looking they may well be very soon.  Go out in a week or two and you'll see lots of them, as long as you know the right place to go!

Let me speak to that first.  The single best spot for finding a wide variety of spring wildflowers in the Beaver Valley is the Mac Kirk Side Trail  up on Old Baldy, the rocky cliff overlooking the village of Kimberley.  This is a wildflower walk I led there a few years back.
 
I should say before I forget, there are lots of less conspicuous spring wildflowers that I'm not covering here, including numerous different tiny wild violets like this white one.

The Wild Ginger is a flower many would miss, because it lies flat on the ground underneath these large green furry leaves, and it's reddish-brown so it doesn't stand out.

The Bellwort has a soft yellow flower that dangles below the leaves.

And there's the Jack-in-the-Pulpit, the unusual flower followed later by a cluster of bright red berries.

The Red Trillium emerges a little before the White Trillium here, and if you can get a picture backlit by the sun the colour is spectacular!

But it's the White Trillium we all wait for, Ontario's official flower, and a large showy bloom to boot.

In the woods behind the Old Baldy cliff is the best display of White Trillium that I know of; there are hundreds of flowers in among the trees and it's just beautiful to see!  Enjoy your walk in the woods!




 

17 comments:

  1. The whites are out in fullness here. I never see the reds. 😞

    ReplyDelete
  2. We saw white trillium on Mackinac Island in 1999. We had taken my parents for their 65th wedding anniversary. Mom had always wanted to visit the island.

    ReplyDelete
  3. We have a different red, I think...which we call Wake Robin, but it's also known for a bad odor. I didn't smell anything when I saw the beginnings of their buds...a few weeks back. Your white trillium forest is beautiful!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Those white trillium are spectacular, especially since it's one of my favorite wildflowers. The only white trillium I know of around here are behind a deer resistant fence -- white-tailed deer relish the leaves and flowers.

    ReplyDelete
  5. The white trillium is beautiful. I was looking at a wild flower book and saw that there is a painted trillium. I don't know where in the world that grows. My bluebells are really wildflowers and they are doing well this year.

    ReplyDelete
  6. That field of trillium is incredible. I have only seen individual plants here.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Both the white and red Trilliums are very lovely. The red one just looks stunning in the bright light.

    ReplyDelete
  8. The flower display makes springtime vey beautiful.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Your woodland flowers come a little later than ours, but certainly make up for it with their profusion and variety.

    ReplyDelete
  10. That is a lovely meadow/hillside of trillium! We have a few growing here and there in our woods.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Love the wildflowers but haven't seen as many this year - yet. Trilliums are such a beauty!

    ReplyDelete
  12. Spring's wildflowers are always something to very much look forward to after struggling through the dregs of winter.

    ReplyDelete
  13. I've never seen so many trillium together at once like that. They don't grow in such profusion here. And that wild red trillium is incredible!!

    ReplyDelete
  14. There are spots up in the Gatineau Hills with lots of trilliums.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Lovely to see these :)

    All the best Jan

    ReplyDelete