Tyler State Park Wildflowers

Fall really isn't the time of year to see wildflowers in Texas.  If you want to see our state at it's best, visit in the spring.  Our highways and country roads are covered in a variety of beautiful native blooms.  Were famous for it.  However, we do have some flower during other times of the year too.  After the heat of summer basically cooks everything around us and turns lots of the wild vegetation one of many shades of brown, eventually we get some late summer/fall showers.  This much needed water coupled with cooler temperatures green up everything practically overnight.  I kid you not, it just shows how well adapted our plants are to our crazy weather.

While in Tyler we saw quite a few wildflowers.  As part of the parks management, they do prescribed burns which allow for a lot of wonderful under story plants to thrive.  The beauty berries and a variety of flowers were looking great.  I have a few below, some of which I was able to identify and others that I finally gave up one.  So in no particular order, here are a few of Tyler State Park's beauties.

First up is  is very well know and widespread.  Solidago altissima or Tall Goldenrod is defiantly one of the signs of fall.  This plant is a pollinator magnet attracting a variety of bees and other flying insects.  It is often confused with the allergy causing ragweed, a wind pollinated plant that make many people miserable each fall since they bloom at the same time.  However, this insect pollinated beauty is not the cause those allergy symptoms.  There are a number of fabulous cultivars that have been created for the garden and are less wild than one we saw.

Solidago altissima or Goldenrod

Next we have Hydrocotyle umbellata or Marsh Pennywort.  This plant loves a moist soil and not surprisingly, I found it near the lake where our campsite was located.  It can even handle being submerged in water.  My research mention that it should not be ingested and that this plant can absorb toxic substances, such as herbicides, pesticides, and pollutants..  It would be a great one to have around a pond or somewhere there was a lot of runoff. the flowers weren't the showiest, but the leaves were really nice.

Hydrocotyle umbellata or Marsh Pennywort

Next we come to a four petaled yellow flower that neither the Plant Geek nor I can identify the poor thing.  It kind of looks like a primrose or a sundrop, but not exactly.  I'm not sure if the rain beat it up, or it is just past it's prime, but nothing seems to look like it exactly.  Any ideas would be appreciated.

Next we have the tiny Diodia virginiana or Buttonweed, which is know mostly for being a weed in the lawn.  We have a lot of it in one of our daylily beds.  These flowers are actually really small and eventually turn into these fruits.  It's a pain in the but in the garden, but it did look nice mixed in with the grass.

Diodia virginiana or Buttonweed

Now we come to a few mystery plants.  The first is a lovely blue/purple flower that was on a shrub with silvery leaves.  It was along the edge of the lake, leading me to believe that it likes the extra moisture. 

Here are some cute little white flowers that look a little like forget me nots, but not quite.  These were located up in the woods where there had been a prescribed burn a few years ago.  In the dim light due to the overcast skys, it was hard to get a really good shot, but they were too sweet looking to leave out of this post.

Finally we get back to a few we could identify (because honestly the nest two are pretty easy). We saw this Salvia azurea or Azure Sage in a number of places throughout the park.  They were probably my favorite wildflower that we saw over the weekend.  It's another flower that is popular with pollinators, in this case, bees.

Salvia azurea or Azure Sage 

Last but not least we have Liatris aspera or Tall Blazing Star.   It had taken a bit of a beating in the rain we had earlier in the day and the flowers seemed to sort of stick together rather than be fuzzy like they normally look.  They were also in the area that had been burned.  This flowers is popular with a variety of butterflies, including red admiral, sulfurs, and painted ladies, as well as bees.

Liatris aspera

Hope you enjoyed the glimpse into what we saw during our trip to Tyler, and if you recognize one of our mystery flowers, please pass along it's name.  It's sort of driving us nuts that we an't figure out the answer on our own!