Wildflowers in profusion
Click for greater size and clarity.
While the first place we stopped along US 183 south of Luling on March 31 was covered with Indian paintbrushes and Texas dandelions, the second place, which you saw a couple of posts back, had a much more extensive set of wildflowers, and they were intermingled rather than in separate colonies. Here’s another colorful mixture I found there.
The prominent yellow-fringed red flowers are Gaillardia pulchella, called firewheels and Indian blankets. The red flowers in the back are phlox. The yellow flowers are Engelmann daisies, Engelmannia peristenia. Above the center of the photo you can make out some white flowers that are just forming; they are bull nettle, Cnidoscolus texanus, which I expect will have a starring role in some future post(s). Near the top of the picture, inconspicuously, are a few Texas dandelions. No doubt about it: profusion.
© 2012 Steven Schwartzman
Portraits of Wildflowers 
What a delightful explosion of color.
Lemony (Gr)Egghead
April 6, 2012 at 6:36 AM
Explosion, profusion,
A colorful inclusion.
Steve Schwartzman
April 6, 2012 at 6:47 AM
By the way, I was reminded of your online name the other day when I was in a meadow and came across some annual pennyroyal, a little wildflower whose leaves smell lemony.
Steve Schwartzman
April 6, 2012 at 6:50 AM
Delicious color! ~ L
PS: My native azalea bloomed for the first time this week, and she is a beauty!
pixilated2
April 6, 2012 at 7:18 AM
Delicious and appetizing, but I hope you won’t be tempted to nibble any of these. I’m glad to hear about your native azalea. I photographed a native azalea, Rhododendron canescens, in far eastern Texas a few years ago. Is that the same species you have there?
Steve Schwartzman
April 6, 2012 at 7:34 AM
To rephrase the old idiom, you’ve given us an embarassment of wildflowers. They’re so beautiful, and certainly advance your argument that bluebonnets aren’t the only good show in town.
shoreacres
April 6, 2012 at 7:25 AM
Your “embarassment of wildflowers” is making me blush.
How right you are that bluebonnets are only one of the flower shows in our part of the world. I’ve given bluebonnets their due in these pages recently, but we have so many hundreds (literally) of other native species here that I’m happy to give some of them equal time.
Steve Schwartzman
April 6, 2012 at 7:39 AM
Fabulous colours! The yellow daisies really set off the fringe on the firewheels.
Cathy
April 6, 2012 at 11:56 AM
I find the mixtures are usually more appealing than the mono-colors. Good observation that the yellow Engelmann daisies set off the fringes of the firewheels.
Steve Schwartzman
April 6, 2012 at 3:57 PM
That is certainly a profusion. Lovely.
Candace
April 6, 2012 at 11:06 PM
I expect you must be seeing some profusion in Arizona, too.
Steve Schwartzman
April 7, 2012 at 7:29 AM
This has to overwhelm the senses. Wonderful profusion, Steve.
Steve Gingold
April 7, 2012 at 1:11 PM
Happy profusion to you, too.
Steve Schwartzman
April 7, 2012 at 3:01 PM
I can’t imagine there’s any way to see such a sight and not simply break out in a huge smile. Or possibly, hives, if one tried too hard not to smile. 🙂
kathryningrid
April 9, 2012 at 4:57 PM
I’ll take the smiles over the hives, if you don’t mind.
Steve Schwartzman
April 9, 2012 at 5:04 PM
[…] you’ve seen several photographs this spring showing firewheels in colonies, and a picture of a stray one starting to open very early in the season, so far this year […]
Firewheel up close « Portraits of Wildflowers
May 11, 2012 at 1:10 PM