Tag Archives: western salsify (Tragopogon dubius)

This ain’t yer daddy’s dandelion

I’m a sucker for dandelions.  I know, they’re the scourge of manicured yards everywhere, but move beyond that boring green sheet of sameness and let a splash of color here and there add some excitement to your lawn.

Close-up of a western salsify (Tragopogon dubius) seed head (20080518_05496)

When they go to seed, it’s like a galaxy full of stars.  One breath is all it takes… to ruin that yawn-inducing disaster you call a landscape.

A western salsify (Tragopogon dubius) seed head (20080518_05499)

Oh, but I said this ain’t yer daddy’s dandelion.  Wanna see why?

My hand next to a western salsify (Tragopogon dubius) seed head for size comparison (20080518_05501)

That’s my grimy paw to give you size comparison.  As seed heads go, this one is bigger than a baseball.  Imagine the mayhem that could cause in your tedious little St. Augustine canvas.

But what creates a seed head that large?

A western salsify (Tragopogon dubius) flower (20080426_04666)

Western salsify (Tragopogon dubius).  Mighty purty, ain’t it?

Close-up of a western salsify (Tragopogon dubius) flower (20080426_04677)

The flowers are like dandelions on steroids.  Huge burning stars of color that stand waist high.

A western salsify (Tragopogon dubius) flower (20080426_04709)

[all photos from White Rock Lake]

That which is to come

Faces rise through the soil, ghostly apparitions of life once buried yet clawing its way to the surface.

They call themselves flowers, these earthly beings, these shining, petaled, hued portraits of aliens.

A spotted cucumber beetle (Diabrotica undecimpunctata) makes its ascent over the petals of a common dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) (20080301_02425)

They open without a sound, yet other marvelous creatures hear their siren songs and rush to partake of the bountiful visage each proffers.

More than was lost the year before is found again with each blossom, each new life.

A close-up of several crowpoison (a.k.a. crow poison or false garlic; Nothoscordum bivalve) flowers (20080301_02394_p)

Soon their armies will march upon the mountains and plot upon the plains.

Soon their kind will take from the sun all that it fells upon the world, and in that taking they will give as much as they consume.

A western honey bee (a.k.a. European honey bee; Apis mellifera) dives to the heart of a showy evening primrose (Oenothera speciosa) to fetch a bit of pollen (20080412_03273)

Lives will do battle with those risen from the ground, will eat of their flesh, and in doing so will give hope to more faces that will glow in generations to come.

What splendor does war in the vernal birth of our planet!  What marvels do manifest!

Western salsify (Tragopogon dubius) blooms and stalks reaching toward the sky (20080426_04675)

Towers will be built.  Traps will be set.  And more faces will rise than can be counted.

We will watch this, we humans, and we will wonder at the beauty of such beasts.

A western honey bee (a.k.a. European honey bee; Apis mellifera) resting atop a full bloom of wild carrot (a.k.a. bishop’s lace or Queen Anne’s lace; Daucus carota) (20080518_05549)

Even as we shrink away from the heat that besets the selves we wish to protect, dirt will crumble as more leviathans reach forth, climb the air above, strip away their winter skins for spring countenances too long hidden away.

Fields will be colored by them.  Winds will carry their essence.  Eyes will rest upon their forms like so many mouths upon a banquet.

A syrphid fly (a.k.a hover fly; Toxomerus marginatus) feeding on the pollen of a Texas dandelion (a.k.a. false dandelion, Carolina desert-chicory, leafy false dandelion or Florida dandelion; Pyrrhopappus carolinianus) (20080518_05376)

What hope have we in light of such unstoppable invasions?

All hope, for vernal is that which is to come: life from lifelessness, growth from dormancy, brilliance from mundane, and new faces from the ashes of those who came before.

— — — — — — — — — —

Mary offered It’s Time for February Eye Candy and David offered Happy first day of spring!, both posting on the same day no less, and I blame them for this sudden want of mine to see the verdant, abundant life of spring.  Not that I don’t like winter, mind you; I love it, in fact, as it’s my favorite season, yet the naturalist within me desires the overflowing bouquet of marvelous flora and fauna that defines where we go from here.

Photos:

[1] A spotted cucumber beetle (Diabrotica undecimpunctata) makes its ascent over the petals of a common dandelion (Taraxacum officinale).

[2] As toxic as it is beautiful: crowpoison (a.k.a. crow poison or false garlic; Nothoscordum bivalve).

[3] A western honey bee (a.k.a. European honey bee; Apis mellifera) dives to the heart of a showy evening primrose (Oenothera speciosa) to fetch a bit of pollen.

[4] A non-native species considered invasive in many parts, western salsify (Tragopogon dubius) produces large, elegant flowers.  All the towering buds you see around it are of the same species.

[5] A western honey bee (a.k.a. European honey bee; Apis mellifera) resting atop a full bloom of wild carrot (a.k.a. bishop’s lace or Queen Anne’s lace; Daucus carota).  Behind both towers yet another flower of the same plant has yet to open.

[6] A syrphid fly (a.k.a hover fly; Toxomerus marginatus) feeding on the pollen of a Texas dandelion (a.k.a. false dandelion, Carolina desert-chicory, leafy false dandelion or Florida dandelion; Pyrrhopappus carolinianus).