We interrupt this travelogue for National Prairie Day
I’m still psyched up over the great places we visited last month, and many more pictures from them are coming. Even so, let me interrupt for National Prairie Day so you can see a little of what was happening on the Blackland Prairie when we got back home. Having spotted basket-flowers (Plectocephalus americanus) in several locations on our trip, on May 19th I went out to see what had become of the great colony I photographed on the Blackland Prairie in Pflugerville last year. Well, as often happens in nature, this wasn’t such a great spring for them in that spot. Still, I managed to find a sparser yet still pretty stand on another property about a mile away. The low white flowers mixed in were prairie bishop (Bifora americana). Also present were firewheels (Gaillardia pulchella) and greenthread (Thelesperma filifolium). And at the first prairie parcel, look how a snail had climbed up on some dry grass near a flowering greenthread group.
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One theme in my commentaries has been that our government isn’t allowed to coerce entities to do things for it that the Constitution forbids the government to do itself. Along those lines, as Amy Howe reported on May 30 in SCOTUSblog:
“The Supreme Court on Thursday reinstated a lawsuit by the National Rifle Association, alleging that a New York official violated the group’s First Amendment rights when she urged banks and insurance companies not to do business with it in the wake of the 2018 shooting at a Florida high school. In a unanimous decision by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the justices agreed that the NRA had made out a case that Maria Vullo, then the head of New York’s Department of Financial Services, had gone too far in her efforts to get companies and banks to cut ties with the NRA, crossing over the line from efforts to persuade the companies and banks – which would be permitted – to attempts to coerce them, which are not.”
You can read the full article.
© 2024 Steven Schwartzman
Portraits of Wildflowers 
here’s to all of the lovely praries, and thank you for sharing them with us each day
beth
June 1, 2024 at 4:20 AM
Yes, and you’re welcome. Prairies are our most diminished and therefore endangered ecotype. I’m fortunate to have some prairie parcels on the east side of the Austin area.
Steve Schwartzman
June 1, 2024 at 8:23 AM
Thank you, Steve, for the beautiful photos of the prairies, and especially the cute snail!
Joanna
gabychops
June 1, 2024 at 4:41 AM
Well, they say it takes one to know one.
Steve Schwartzman
June 1, 2024 at 11:21 AM
Thank you, Steve, for your somewhat enigmatic comment! I don’t think that either you or I have any similarities with however cute snail!
Joanna
gabychops
June 1, 2024 at 11:37 AM
If not with the snail itself, then with the abstract quality of cuteness.
Steve Schwartzman
June 1, 2024 at 11:46 AM
The depth of your intellect, Steve, is astonishing!
Joanna
gabychops
June 1, 2024 at 11:49 AM
Happy Prairie Day!
circadianreflections
June 1, 2024 at 10:12 AM
And the same to you. It’s always good to remember our endangered ecosystems.
Steve Schwartzman
June 1, 2024 at 11:22 AM
Long live the prairies. Your photos have been celebrating their beauty and diversity all along.
If I had been on my toes and paying attention, I could have done a post in honor of this fascinating ecosystem, but I’m hopelessly behind and disorganized.
tanjabrittonwriter
June 1, 2024 at 11:32 AM
It may not be too late, as half of June 1st remains. Whether it’s enough time to move forward a bit from hopelessly behind and still put out a post today, well, that’s for you to decide. There’s always next year’s National Prairie Day. Sometimes I’ve set up a dummy post well in advance for a date I want to celebrate, filling in the contents as the date approaches. I did that some time ago with the post scheduled for three days from now, and with another for June 18.
Steve Schwartzman
June 1, 2024 at 11:45 AM
Definitely NOT enough time for me today. I have planned ahead for other special days, eg. for World Wetlands Day in February. I have scheduled a post for 2/2/25 but still need to complete it. But each time I look at my WP dashboard, I’m reminded that it awaits my attention.
tanjabrittonwriter
June 1, 2024 at 5:45 PM
Then we’ve both resorted to planning ahead. As you indicated, sometimes we find out about an occasion too late to do anything about it.
Steve Schwartzman
June 1, 2024 at 5:53 PM
It is interesting how the lower dried leaf that forms an x with other leaf can be seen as an extension of the snail’s spiral.
Peter Klopp
June 1, 2024 at 1:03 PM
I hadn’t caught that. You have good geometrical perception.
Steve Schwartzman
June 1, 2024 at 1:14 PM
This may be the first time a post has shocked me. Seeing those basket-flowers was completely unexpected; it brought home how utterly out of touch I’ve been with what’s happening in the natural world over the past couple of months. While I’ve been fighting weather and meeting work deadlines, the world’s kept rolling right along. If I don’t get with the program, I’m going to miss summer, too — and I sure wouldn’t want to miss the basket-flowers!
shoreacres
June 1, 2024 at 3:19 PM
I’m sorry weather and practical considerations have kept you a stranger to nature for the past couple of months. These pictures are two weeks old already, so the basket-flowers may well have passed their peak by now. Let’s hope they got going later in some places near you. I checked Facebook’s Texas Wildflowers group just now and the one picture someone posted recently of a fresh basket-flower was from Krum. I hoped that might be near you but a map shows it’s up north close to Denton.
Steve Schwartzman
June 1, 2024 at 4:52 PM
I’d forgotten until tonight that, in the past, our basket-flowers bloomed after yours. It’s always seemed odd to me, but I suspect there’s some reason for the consistent difference. We’ll see.
shoreacres
June 1, 2024 at 8:01 PM
And see you shall, given the later bloom time in your area and the lead you got from iNaturalist.
Steve Schwartzman
June 1, 2024 at 9:16 PM
The prairies deserve their special day – hope it serves to remind people how important they are and encourages their protection.
Ann Mackay
June 2, 2024 at 3:35 AM
I hope you’re right, given that prairies are our most endangered ecosystem.
Steve Schwartzman
June 2, 2024 at 7:46 AM