Mill Hill Regional Park

On Sunday I went on the Wild Flower walk at Mill Hill Regional Park. We followed our naturalist guide up the rocky trail to the summit.  I did not make it to the very top.  Apparently there is a marvelous view that I missed.  The photo above is a tapestry of some of the wild flowers in bloom now.  Drabas, camas, shooting stars, fawn lilies and many more. 

These tiny blue flowers are blue-eyed mary, the pink ones are a variety of thrift or armeria.

Two of my best shots of the calypso bulbosa orchids.  There are quite a few of these tiny beauties out now.  They need a special soil fungus to grow, so I have not found any available at the plant nurseries, yet.  They would be very difficult to grow, with a very short period of bloom.

This is a large patch of camas.  The death camas have white blossoms.  The native people would remove all of the white flowering camas, so that they could eat the bulbs after they had matured.  I have a very nice camas growing in my garden.  I must keep all the 'blue bells' away from it, as the foliage is similar and the blossoms are the same color and look similar too.

a draba.  I am not sure which one this is.  I now have 2 tiniest ones in my little rockery.  This is a macro shot of the plant.. They are very very tiny, also.

A fawn lily.  There are large patches of these lovely lilies.  I have some growing in my woodland area.  I also have a yellow variety. 

This is miner's lettuse with the flowers open.  The photo from my previous post of this flower, had the blossoms in bud. 

There were many of these showy shooting stars (dodecathenon) in bloom.  I have not been successful in getting one to grow in my garden yet.  Perhaps its because the leaves look like they might be a dandilion kind of a weed.

The skunk cabbage were quite a distance away and down from the path.  We were not to go off the path, of course.  These were not very prime specimens of this plant either.  I hope this colony expands and grows larger plants.  The leaves seem to be under attack from something. 

a Trillium.  three petals, three leaves.   There were quite a few of these in the park.  Its nice to see these protected flowers becoming more abundant.  According to our Naturalist guide it takes 10 years for a plant to reach the flowering stage.  I am doubly amazed at the one in my woodland garden that has to blossoms, this year.  There is a large leaved plant growing over the area where this trillium grows.  Maybe they like it crowded, because the one in the front garden is not doing quite so well.  I keep the other plants from growing within its 12 inch diameter circle.  Perhaps it needs more leaf mold and a bit more shade.... a cool, moist root run.

the little yellow wood violets are really very pretty up close.  I have purple violets in my garden and find them very invasive.  These little plants did not seem to be quite so invasive.