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Category: The Larger Garden | Posted: Mon Aug 29, 2011 1:46 am

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We had record snowfall at Mount Rainier this year. My good friend Jen called me and we had a girls hike up from the east entrance of Mt. Rainier, (Sunrise entrance), to Summerland Meadow on Saturday. Paradise, on the southwest side, is still under 9 feet of snow!



Summerland meadow, Mt. Rainier ( photo / image / picture from Karrma's Garden )

The flowers are not used to all this snow, and there is still the earliest flowers, avalanche lilies, along with all the rest, sharing the meadows with the maples, whose leaves are already starting to change to fall colors. We saw more than half the flowers that were in our small plant book, and here are a few. Unfortunately the automatic focus on my camera is off, so some are a bit blurry.

The Coralroot looks so fragile, hiding in the shadows of the Douglas fir and Hemlocks.



Coral Root ( photo / image / picture from Karrma's Garden )

Several convoluted fungi were in the fir needles.





unknown fungus ( photo / image / picture from Karrma's Garden )

Merten's bluebells, Indian Paintbrush, Mountain Ash, Rosy Spirea were at lower elevations.


Merten's Bluebell ( photo / image / picture from Karrma's Garden )

As we got above the falls at Fryingpan Creek, there was valerian, columbine, Cascade azaleas in the open, Wild valerian was one of the most common flowers, seen with both columbine and with Lewis' monkeyflower.


Lewis' Monkeyflower and wild Valerian ( photo / image / picture from Karrma's Garden )






Wild Columbine and Valerian ( photo / image / picture from Karrma's Garden )






Cascade azalea ( photo / image / picture from Karrma's Garden )




and small delicate yellow Violets, and pink salmonberry flowers in the shade.


( photo / image / picture from Karrma's Garden )




wild salmonberry ( photo / image / picture from Karrma's Garden )

Up in the main meadow, with the view of Mt. Rainier, Little Tahoma, on a rock next to the creek, we had lunch, watched chipmunks, smelled the heather and fresh air.








Wild heather next to streambed ( photo / image / picture from Karrma's Garden )


There were huge patches of phlox up on the hillside to look at, nearby were smaller patches. A white flowered stalk above lacy feathery type leaves, was either not pictured in our book, or was a cold beaked lousewort )I guess not all common names are poetic) with paler stalk, as the pictures I have of that showed a reddish stem, and these were pale.



Phlox in foreground, not sure of white flower. ( photo / image / picture from Karrma's Garden )

As we got back to the car, we noticed and nibbled on the salmonberries, (what color are salmonberries?)
as we cooled off our feet in Fryingpan Creek before the drive home.









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eileen wrote on Mon Aug 29, 2011 9:22 am:

So glad your friend took her camera with her. What a lovley selection of wildflowers she found. Many thanks for sharing them with us.

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