What I found on the prairie
Click for better color and greater clarity.
On July 29, as we were driving north on Interstate 35 just past Howard Ln., we suddenly saw on our right some Liatris mucronata plants that were flowering a bit ahead of schedule.* The next day I went back with my camera to the tract that I call the Pflugerville Prairie and took a bunch of pictures. The one shown here plays off the gayfeathers or blazing-stars, as they’re known, against a colony of greenthread, Thelesperma filifolium, a species that has been having a summer resurgence in many places around Austin in recent weeks.
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* This wasn’t freakishly before the usual time, as you saw in a post in May, but just a matter of weeks.
© 2012 Steven Schwartzman
Portraits of Wildflowers 
How come you had to go back? Don’t you carry your camera with you all the the time Steve? LOL 🙂 Just kidding – I love the colour combination in this shot. It’s beautiful!
photosfromtheloonybin
August 3, 2012 at 6:20 AM
It might seem that I have a camera permanently attached to my hand, Cindy, but I’ll confess that I don’t. When we caught sight of the flowers we were on our way to lunch at the house of some friends, so I’d left my equipment home. In any case, I’m glad you like the combination of the purple and yellow.
Steve Schwartzman
August 3, 2012 at 6:48 AM
Simply stunning…
and I still can’t grow them.
~ Lynda
pixilated2
August 3, 2012 at 6:53 AM
Sorry you’re having trouble growing these, Lynda. I’m happy enough knowing some places where they spring up on their own. Unfortunately, most of those locations will eventually get built on, as some already have.
Steve Schwartzman
August 3, 2012 at 7:03 AM
Que ta prairie est belle
lancoliebleue
August 3, 2012 at 6:57 AM
Tu as raison, Val. Depuis huit ans j’habite l’autre côté d’Austin, dans les collines, mais je vais de temps en temps à la prairie pour ses fleurs.
Steve Schwartzman
August 3, 2012 at 7:09 AM
Wow Liatris grows wild where you live? Way cool. We had several groupings in our “English Garden” at our previous home…loved that little oasis we had there!
dhphotosite
August 3, 2012 at 8:08 AM
Yes, there are multiple species in Texas, but this is the one I always see here.
Steve Schwartzman
August 3, 2012 at 10:25 AM
I was just shooting some wildflowers over the weekend with that same color combination – and the addition of pink. Nature favors these colors. Lovely shot, as always.
Dawn
August 3, 2012 at 8:09 AM
Thanks. I’d gladly have included some pink but I didn’t see much of that color. (I did encounter a couple of Texas thistles still flowering, but not near the Liatris.)
Steve Schwartzman
August 3, 2012 at 10:57 AM
I have this variety throughout my gardens. They are a bright light this time of year–as one species ends and another unfolds. They stay around and feed lots of visitors, Sally
lensandpensbysally
August 3, 2012 at 10:44 AM
I’m glad you get to enjoy them without having to travel as far from Delaware as Texas.
Steve Schwartzman
August 3, 2012 at 11:00 AM
Interesting that at the bottom of the stalks, where the buds still are closed, they so closely resemble broadleaf plantain. The feathery green spikes here aren’t as fuzzy as the hairs on the other plantain you showed us, but they’re still quite a lovely detail.
shoreacres
August 3, 2012 at 3:27 PM
I looked at the Wikipedia article for Plantago major and saw what you mean in the third photograph there:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plantago_major
There are some species of Liatris that grow in your coastal part of Texas that you can keep an eye out for now that we’re in August.
Steve Schwartzman
August 3, 2012 at 5:20 PM
Beautiful as always Steve! Great color combination as well!
Michael Glover
August 8, 2012 at 9:35 PM
Yes, give me purple and yellow any time, Michael.
Steve Schwartzman
August 8, 2012 at 10:36 PM
[…] of two wildflowers. The spiky ones were Liatris mucronata, called gayfeather and blazing-star, a photograph of which you saw in its fresh state on this same property four months ago. The many spherical seed head […]
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