[BULBS-L] Spring Wildflower Walk

Joyce Miller onager@midtown.net
Sun, 20 Apr 2003 10:04:02 PDT
Hi all,
	Wild flower walks seem to be the activity of the season.  Yesterday, I 
joined the University of California, at Davis, Botany Club on a field trip 
to Table Mountain.  Table Mountain has an elevation of 1,000 ft (roughly 
300 metres) and is located east of Oroville, California, in the lower 
Sierra Nevada foothills.  Table Mountain is a basalt area, flat and the 
site of multiple of vernal pools.  I was fascinated.  Some of our 
California natives bulbs were flowering:  Brodeia, Bloomeria, Dichlostemma, 
Allium, etc.

	Wonderful outing.   The benefit of going with that group is that they can 
identify some of the wild flowers and some dutiful soul always brings the 
Jepson Manual (of California Native Plants)as well as a list of the plants 
for that area.

   I was able to collect some immature seed pods.  This, BTW, is the point 
of my note.  One botanist holds that immature seed pods will continue to 
ripen and cure off the mother plant when placed in a light, airy, warm 
place.  Over the years, there have been many inquires about when to harvest 
seed.  I am especially hopeful the Allium sp seeds will ripen so that I can 
raise it for the California Native Plant Society Demonstration Garden in 
Sacramento, California.

	Just the Saturday prior, I had taken an all day class in the 
identification of plants.  Having that experience, I will never look at a 
flower the same.  And now I have the tools to identify plants.

	Best wishes, Joyce Miller, Sacramento, California. Zone 9A


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