a little bit of beauty

It has been a dry spring around here, had some storms this AM and got some much needed rain. As I checked fences saw something that caught my eye, the prairie is something to see even with our lack of rain.


God sure new what to grow in our KS climate. The other (man planted) grasses look terrible this year, makes me wish more of the prairie hadn't been tilled around here.

Nature doesn't just endure, it thrives. I did some work for prairie wildflower restoration last year, seed gathering. Planted several small plots from some of the seeds collected. A lot of the prairie species take two years to flower. The first year is just spent growing a long tap-root to survive the hot summer conditions of the prairie. Most of the pasture grasses and crops have shallow root systems, and the dry cycles that hit the prairie regions are too much for most without some form of irrigation. Cool pics! Nice to see some of those wild places allowed to thrive.

You know the roots of cone flower is valuable?

and the seeds

Nice pics Andrew! It is good to see green and flowers again. Our coneflowers are a month or so out here.
Zim

nice pic thanks for sharing

Nice spread of pallida echenasia. We have some agustifolia up here, Andy. Love the butterfly weed this time of year, too. The prarie is a wonderful place, too bad it gets so hot, though!

Lee, them words is to big for me. You talking about them pink thangs.
Danny, I had heard tell of folks digging the root. The rocks are to close here for much digging, but if the seeds are worth pickin that would be doable. I have been known to pick the dry heads off and spread them around a bit.

Thanks for sharing.

Cool pics

Called snake root around here

Anytime I'm looking at creation I am just in awe at what I see

Just like tonight we were catching crappie and to look at the beauty of a common fish, a duck, a tree. It's just amazing to me

The Agustifolia is the high priced Cone flower and the Pallida is the cheap Cone flower. Last year the Agustifolia was in the $14.00 + range and the Pallida was some where around $2.00 a pound for dry root. I think the Herb was around $1.25 a dry pound You got to know the right one to dig to get the top money on them. The high priced root has a chalky look to the root and the low priced root is darker in color. I think there is more of the high priced root in Montana if I remember correct.
I also like the butterfly weed with the beautiful orange color to the flowers. I think the Pleurisy root or what is called true butterfly root is some where in the $4.00 range. I haven't checked on prices this year so I might be a bit off on the price range.