What's blooming in High Park, late August

Summer is at its climax, and there's lots to see in High Park! The current stars in the flowering native plant world are

• Desmodium canadense (showy tick trefoil, desmodie du Canada)
• Helianthus divaricatus (woodland sunflower, hélianthe à feuilles étalées, shown above)
• Silphium perfoliatum (cup plant, plante bain d'oiseaux)

  Other natives in bloom include

  • Ambrosia artemisiifolia (ragweed, petite herbe à poux) (yippee)
  • Ratibida pinnata (grey-headed coneflower, ratibida à feuilles pennées)
  • Rudbeckia hirta (black eyed Susan, rudbeckie dressée)
  • Verbena stricta (hoary vervain, verveine veloutée)
  The various Solidago spp. (goldenrods, verges d'or) are just getting started, but no sign of the Symphyotrichum spp. (asters) yet.

  Of course there are also various non-native wildflowers kicking around, such as

  • Cichoricum intybus (chicory, chicorée sauvage)
  • Daucus carota (Queen Anne's Lace, carotte sauvage)
  • Melilotus albus (sweet clover, mélilot blanc)
  • Trifolium repens (white clover, trèfle blanc)

  I spent part of Sunday morning weeding the Boulevard Beds, which are a showcase for native plants near High Park's Grenadier Restaurant. Most of my efforts were focused on Lunaria annua (aka money plant, annual honesty, silver dollars, lunaire annuelle, or monnaie-du-pape). I used to think this plant was pretty. Those papery seedpods are a lot less pretty when you're trying to pick a million of them out from leaf litter. If you are thinking of growing this non-native in your garden, be warned! Harvest the ornamental seed pods promptly, before they fall on the ground and make life miserable.

What's blooming in High Park, late July

I had a great time with the High Park Volunteer Stewardship Program pulling weeds in the Sculpture Garden restoration site yesterday. There are tons of flowers in bloom now:

Natives

• Achillea millefolium (yarrow, achillée millefeuille)
• Asclepias syriaca (milkweed, bébé lala de lait) (only a few are still blooming, most are setting seed)
• Campanula rotundifolia (harebell, campanule à feuilles rondes)
• Conyza canadensis (horseweed, vergerette du Canada)
• Desmodium canadense (showy tick trefoil, desmodie du Canada) (shown above)
• Erigeron annuus (daisy fleabane, vergerette annuelle)
• Helianthus divaricatus (woodland sunflower, hélianthe à feuilles étalées)
• Lobelia cardinalis (cardinal flower, lobélie cardinale)
• Monarda fistulosa (wild bergamot, monarde fistuleuse)
• some kind of Potentilla, maybe Potentilla fruticosa (shrubby cinquefoil, potentille arbustive)
• Rudbeckia hirta (black-eyed Susan, rudbeckie dressée)
• Silphium perfoliatum (cup plant, plante bain d'oiseaux)
• Verbena stricta (hoary vervain, verveine veloutée)

Others

• Cichorium intybus (chicory, chicorée sauvage)
• Daucus carota (Queen Anne's lace, nid d'oiseau)
• Melilotus alba (white sweet clover, mélilot blanc)
• Pastinaca sativa (wild parsnip, panais sauvage)
• Polygonum sp. (smartweed, renouée)
• Trifolium pratense (red clover, trèfle violet)

We also saw a big wasp dragging a caterpillar to a hole she had previously dug, presumably to lay eggs on it. Although I felt sorry for the caterpillar, it was fascinating to watch. In Growing Green (White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green Publishing, 2006), an intriguing book about veganic food production, Jenny Hall and Iain Tolhurst recommend growing native plants near fields of crops to attract beneficial insects such as parasitic wasps.

What's blooming in High Park, late May

I've just got back from pulling garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata, herbe à ail), an extremely invasive plant here in Toronto which I've ranted about before, with the High Park Volunteer Stewardship Program. The wild lupines (Lupinus perennis, lupin sauvage, shown above) are starting to bloom, so this is the week to go see and admire them.

In all, I saw the following in bloom:

Natives

• Lupinus perennis (wild lupine, lupin sauvage)
• Maianthemum stellatum (starry false Solomon's seal, maïanthème étoilé)
• Viola sp. (violet, violette)

Non-Natives

• Alliaria petiolata (garlic mustard, herb à ail) (invasive)
• Chelidonium majus (greater celandine, grande chélidoine) (invasive)
• Hieracium caespitosum (yellow hawkweed, épervière des prés)
• Silene latifolia (white campion, silène blanc)
• Stellaria sp. (chickweed, stellaire)
• Taraxacum officinale (dandelion, pissenlit commun)

What's blooming in High Park, late September

Sunday was a perfect day for planting with the High Park Volunteer Stewardship Programme. Summer is coming to an end, but there are many plants still in bloom. The asters are the current stars; I was especially impressed with the white heath aster (Symphyotrichum ericoides, aster ericoïde), which has gorgeous plumes densely packed with small white flowers. So-called sky blue aster (Symphyotrichum oolentiangense, aster azuré) creates clouds of soft pale lavender, while New England aster (Symphyotrichum novae-angliae, aster de Nouvelle-Angleterre) has big bright purple flowers. There are still some goldenrods (Solidago spp., verges d'or) and woodland sunflowers (Helianthus divaricatus, hélianthe à feuilles étalées), complementing the mauve asters with their bright yellow blooms. I also saw Campanula rotundifolia (harebells, campanule à feuilles rondes) in bloom for the first time in real life!

We planted seedlings of native plants at a new site (the former Sculpture Garden), including

• Andropogon gerardii (big bluestem, barbon de Gérard)
• Apocynum androsaemifolium (spreading dogbane, apocyn à feuilles d'androsème)
• Asclepias tuberosa (butterflyweed, asclépiade tubéreuse)
• Campanula rotundifolia (harebell, campanule à feuilles rondes)
• Monarda fistulosa (wild bergamot, monarde fistuleuse)
• Schizachyrium scoparium (little bluestem, schizachyrium à balais)
• Solidago juncea (early goldenrod, verge d'or jonciforme)
• Symphyotrichum ericoides (white heath aster, aster ericoïde)
• Symphyotrichum oolentangiense (sky blue aster, aster azuré)

and others that I don't remember. (My son said they look like they're just weeds, but next year I'm sure they'll be lovely.) Nearby, another patch of ground was covered with heavy black plastic to kill the weeds through solarization. We'll be planting there next year.

Tiarella cordifolia foliage

Tiarella cordifolia, known in English as "Allegheny foamflower" or "heart-leaved foamflower", and in French as tiarelle cordifoliée, is a perennial native to eastern North America.

I bought this plant from High Park Volunteer Stewardship Program. I find it interesting that it has little purple markings on the leaves.

What's blooming in High Park

On Sunday, I participated in a planting through the High Park Volunteer Stewardship Program. I took all kinds of lovely photos, which I accidentally permanently deleted when trying to fix serious problems I've been having with my computer. So you'll just have to click the links to see photos of the species we planted: Monarda fistulosa (wild bergamot), Rudbeckia hirta (black-eyed Susan), Elymus canadensis (Canada wild rye), Schizachyrium scoparium (little bluestem), and more.

At a nearby restoration site, native Penstemon hirsutis (hairy beard tongue) and non-native Hieracium praealtum (king devil) were in bloom, and elsewhere in the park, native Achillea millefolium (yarrow) was blooming.

Most beautiful of all, and I really regret losing these photos, were the native wild lupines (Lupinus perennis). I'll try to get out to High Park and take more photos before it's too late; I encourage you to get out there too if you can. There is a huge colony of wild lupines on the east side of West Road (map of High Park (PDF)).

My first time volunteering with the High Park VSP!

I've been wanting to get involved with the High Park Volunteer Stewardship Program for over a year but usually my son is with me on Sunday mornings when they do their thing. But this weekend he's at the cottage with his dad and stepmother, so I got to attend today and help pull garlic mustard, a plant I love to hate as readers of this blog will know. We were working on an area south of the Black Oak Café, which had about a zillion garlic mustard plants in bloom, and some starting to set seed. Frankly it looked rather futile to me, but with a large number of volunteers we cleared a huge area in only a couple of hours. I'm hoping the before and after pics the organizers took will be posted online soon; if you're in High Park, just follow the road downhill behind the Black Oak Café and note the huge difference between the right side where we were pulling and the left side which is still a sea of garlic mustard.

For me the high point was discovering this very well camouflaged toad, which I thought was a clod of dirt until it started to hop. Anyone know what species this little treasure is? Our work also uncovered a chipmunk (too fast to photograph), starry false Solomon's seal (native), greater celandine (not native), and numerous maple seedlings.

Afterwards, I headed for Rainbow Market Square to see Star Trek, arriving a couple of hours early to make sure I got in (it was sold out when I tried to see it yesterday). Ticket in hand, I went to a nearby antique store, Ephemera Too, where I discovered this wonderful book, How to Know the Wild Flowers, by Mrs. William Starr Dana, published in 1899! It's a treasure trove of short articles and full-page black-and-white illustrations of a variety of north-eastern North American wildflowers, mostly native. How could I resist? I decided it would be my birthday present to myself (only 6 weeks early).

(The movie was great too!)

High Park VSP Plant Sale coming May 3

The High Park Volunteer Stewardship Program is having their spring native plant sale on Sunday, May 3, 11-2, at the greenhouse. You can view the plant list (PDF) online; prices are very reasonable.