Ragged Robin

Day 232: A couple of years ago, my sister-of-the-heart Patty sent me some seed from her Ragged Robins (Lychnis flos-cuculi). I planted most of them in an enormous pot just outside my kitchen door, with the remainder going along the west side of my house. The following spring, I saw rosettes of leaves developing in the pot. "Hm," I said, "those must be Ragged Robins." They didn't bloom that first year, so in order to prevent myself from pulling them up as some sort of weed, I stuck a label in the pot. When the second spring came around, I was happy to see stems with buds rising above the rosettes, and sure enough, they bloomed. I let them go to seed in the hopes of having more, but as such things occasionally happen, the label faded or went missing, and at some point during the winter, I apparently decided to weed the pot. At first when no Ragged Robins came up in it, I blamed critters, but then a niggling memory suggested that I had indeed been my own worst enemy. I was very sad, very sad indeed, and moreso when Patty posted pictures of her Ragged Robins and asked me how mine were doing. But all was not lost! Remember I said that I'd thrown some seed down on the west side of my house? I even marked off the area as a "no-mow" zone. There are only a few, but I still have Ragged Robins.

This story puts me in mind of one from my childhood. My father was a diligent weeder, and decided to help my mother by pulling all the thistles out of her flower beds. Unfortunately, the "thistles" were in fact her Oriental poppies. I don't think she ever forgave him.

Macro Walk

Day 203: Yesterday was One of Those Days. I spent 45 minutes on the phone with a "virtual assistant" trying to install a new key fob for my alarm system, and we never managed to get through the first step. I finally told her I simply wanted to return it for a refund, so she transferred me to another department. The process there took half an hour or more, and by the time we were done, I was at my wits' end. The mail came, bringing with it a squashed and mangled box of Merry's broths, and since my order had gone through a third-party seller, another half hour in a chat session never successfully resolved the issue. Next pictures and story, I poured my slipper full of chicken blood when I took the thawed meat out of the refrigerator to make dinner. After supper, I sat down to put some photos on the computer and couldn't get the data cable to acknowledge the camera's existence. It's been failing for some time, and finally just gave up. As did I. I said, "Screw this!" and went to bed cross at the entire world. This morning, I decided to follow a friend's advice and went into the woods, despite it being Saturday. I turned a mile-and-a-half ramble into a Macro Walk to bring you this selection of wildflowers and weeds blooming along the lower reach of Pack Forest's Hugo Peak trail. I'm not going to identify them for you. They're all fairly common except the Calypso Orchids which were really the highlight of my walk.

Lodi's Wildflowers

Day 303: You may find yourself a little short of breath if you hop out of your car at 6400' and begin racing up the trail from the Sunrise parking area to the crest of Sourdough Ridge, so on this too-warm and smoky day, it was even more important for me to adopt a snail's pace for my hike. Last year, I had not had time to make it all the way to Lodi Creek before the volunteer picnic; I'd gotten shanghaied by visitors at Frozen Lake and stayed there as long as I could, trying to keep them from feeding the chipmunks. When you're in uniform, your personal goals are secondary to the needs of the Park's guests, so we'd allowed some extra time this year for hiking, although I estimated that it was still barely enough for me to make the trek and be back in time for the picnic. Kevin stayed behind at Sunrise to take care of some administrative tasks.

Over the course of a 12-hour work day, I spoke with 129 visitors at Sunrise alone, answering questions about the weather, the trails, the notable absence of birds (smoke-related), wildlife, and of course plants, plants, always plants. I recruited five potential new Meadow Rovers and two greenhouse volunteers (one, a Master Gardener), and gave water to a parched hiker who had misjudged how much he'd need on his own hike (a common occurrence). My annual ablutions were fulfilled with a ritual swim in a hidden lake where I found one new plant (as yet not identified by me), and I even spent half an hour lugging 4' slabs of cedar puncheon to a site where trail crew was replacing a footbridge. The hike to Lodi was a mere two miles one way, but between heat, smoke and visitor contacts, required an hour and a half to complete. Once there, I had time to take a few pictures and put my hands in the water (my customary greeting to this old friend), and then I was headed back up the hill, grateful for a cloud which settled in to block the sun during the steepest part of the ascent. At the picnic, I socialized with some 60+ volunteers and handed out service awards to those who had put in the hours or years required for recognition.

All other things aside, it was those five minutes I spent with my old friend Lodi which "made my day." We had many good times together during my active backpacking years, Lodi and I. Rain or shine, Lodi's cheerful chuckle always greeted me when I was en route to Berkeley, Grand Park or Fire Creek, and the abundance of wildflowers along its moisture-rich course were often the highlight of a trip around the Northern Loop. There are no rarities here, just a lush garden of memories only I can see.

MeadoWatch

Day 308 (bonus edition): So what is this "MeadoWatch" thing I was talking about in my earlier post? Well, it's a program developed at the University of Washington to study the response of plants to climate change, particularly in the subalpine meadows where such changes will be most keenly felt. Participants in the program hike along specific transects, stopping at predetermined waypoints where they record the phenological phases of ten focal plant species. Ideally, the program will have up to three individual volunteers or groups of volunteers hiking each transect every day throughout the growth period to limit the error factor inherent in any research involving observation. The broad section of data gathered in this manner is then correlated in such a fashion that patterns can be tracked. Are the flowers earlier at a certain altitude this year than last year? Did snowpack persist later into the season? Are flowers blooming before or after the pollinators for their species arrive? MeadoWatch aids researchers by acquiring hard data from citizen scientists who have more time to spend in the field.