HAMISH AND WILDFLOWERS-1

Last Christmas a gnome was sent to me by my friend, Linda Sue, who lives in Bellingham, Washington.

 He was NOT pleased with our winter weather.  He pretty much sat in a corner and sulked.

 So I brought him to camp.  He cheered up and even told me his name.  He is Billy N. Hamish, or just Hamish. He doesn’t seem to mind posing with wildflowers and appeared happy to go with me on a walk around the area to see what was blooming.

 Right next to our camper trailer we found a bunch of pretty purple-blue flowers.

 They’re called Larkspurs and are related to Delphiniums.  My book says they’re full of alkaloids and can be deadly to cattle who decide to make a meal of them.

 The spicy smell of sage brush floated up when I walked through this plant with gray-green leaves.
To me sage smells like rain.

With the sage was a variety of Everlasting or Pussytoes.  They are claimed to be nourishing and pleasant tasting. I also found Wild Chives.  I tasted them and they would go nicely with sour cream on baked potatoes.

 Next to the Pussytoes were tiny flowers of Blue-Eyed Grass.

 Down in a boggy area and I found a field of Blue Camas.   I recognized them right away since I have some blooming in my garden at home.

 Camas was an important food source for Native Americans.  They taught early settlers to dig up the bulbs which can be eaten raw, cooked or dried.

 It is also wise to gather the bulbs when the plants are in bloom so they aren’t confused with poisonous Death Camas which has a white flower.

 The Camas was growing so thick and was so blue that the meadow almost looked like a lake.

 With some careful looking I found some small flowers for Hamish to pose by called Woodland Stars.

 By now my gnome friend was bored and took a snooze in my camera case so he wasn’t available to pose with these members of the Clematis family called, Sugarbowl.  When they go to seed they grow long white hippy hair just like a lot of people.

The plan is to take Hamish with me to check out other wild flowers as they come into bloom during the summer.  I’m learning a lot but really miss not being able to find answers instantly on the internet.