Oregon Iris (Iris tenax)

Iris tenax

Toughleaf Iris

Description:

• Erect flower stems shorter than grass-like leaves.

• Leaves bright green with red to pink base, deciduous, to 14 inches tall in tight cluster.

• Flowers usually blue to deep purple, sometimes white to cream. Flowers 1 or occasionally 2 per stem, perianth tube from flower to ovary only 1/4 inch., 1 or 2 clasping leaves protect the buds.

• The tough leaf fiber has been used for nets, snares and ropes.

• Rarity: Common

• Flowering Time: Late Spring

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 8 to 14 inches

• Habitat: West-Side Forest, Meadow

• Found In: Olympic National Park

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Northwest

Additional Resource: Oregon Flora Project

Red Flowering Currant (Ribes sanguineum)

This shrub is one of the earliest bloomers in the Spring. The berries are edible, though not often consumed by humans.

Ribes sanguineum

Red-Flowering Currant

Description:

• Erect to spreading shrub, without spines on stems.

• Leaves nearly round, 1–3 in. across, palmately divided, 3–5 shallow lobes irregularly toothed, upper side slightly hairy, underside sparsely hairy to covered with white hair.

• Flowers in terminal cluster, 10–20 usually bright blood red, sometimes pink or white. Berries blue-black, tasteless.

• Grows in many habitats in open woods, forests, rocky slopes, near sea level to 7000 ft.

• Sanguineum, meaning "blood red," refers to the flowers. Plants with white-woolly hairs matted on lower surface of leaf are var. sanguineum.

• Rarity: Locally Common

• Flowering Time: Late Spring

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 3--9 feet

• Habitat: West-Side Forest

• Found In: Olympic Np, Mt. Rainier Np, Crater Lake Np, Siskiyous, N Cascades Np

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest

Additional Resource: OregonFlora Project

Great Camas (Camassia leichtlinii)

Camassia leichtlinii

great camas

Description:

• Stem erect, sturdy.

• Basal leaves linear, shorter than stem.

• Flowers many, in spike at stem top, few open at one time but do not open out flat. Flower pale blue, purple, or white; pollen dull yellow to violet; petals twist as they dry to cover seeds as they mature.

• Grows in wet, soggy, deep soils at mid elevations.

• Rarity: Locally Common

• Flowering Time: Mid Spring

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: to 48 inches

• Habitat: West-Side Forest, Bog/Fen/Wetland, Meadow

• Found In: West Gorge And Western Oregon., Crater Lake Np

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest

Source: Neighborhood Naturalist Spring 2011 vol 9

Additional resources:

Oregon Flora Project

Camassia

Scouler's Corydalis (Corydalis scouleri)

A favorite understory plant with soft lacy foliage filling the sides of the trails from late spring to late summer. This plant is related to the Pacific bleeding heart.

Corydalis scouleri

Scouler's Corydalis

Description:

• Stems erect, sturdy, hairless, with a slight covering of bluish waxy powder. Stems hollow.

• Leaves usually 3 from upper part of stem, large, divided into oblong leaflets with rounded or pointed tips.

• Flowers pink, rose, or bi-colored, about 1 in. long, held in neat rows on long narrow spike, long spurs pointing upward or outward.

• Grows in moist woodlands, along shaded stream banks, shaded moist trail sides.

• Rarity: Locally Common

• Flowering Time: Late Spring

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 20--50 inches

• Habitat: West-Side Forest, Moist Riverbanks

• Found In: West Gorge, Olympic Np, Mt. Rainier Np

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest

Additional resource: Oregon Flora Project

Devil's Club (Oplopanax horridus)

Devil's club is a dramatic shrub that has immense maple-like leaves, dense spines, and large conical racemes clustered with red fruits. The small shrub acts well as a barrier plant.

Oplopanax horridus

devil’s club

Description:

• Maple-like leaves, dense spines, and large conical racemes clustered with red fruits.

• The small white flowers bloom with 5 petals, green to greenish-white, eventually maturing into the red-fruited "devil's club".

• The spines cover the branches and the undersides of leaves

• Stems are armed with dense long yellow prickles, often sticking straight out at the base, usually upright, from one to four meters.

• Leaves alternate; blades palmately 5(13)-lobed, 1–4 dm wide, margins serrate, veins prickly; stipulate.

• Inflorescences terminal, compact umbels arranged in elongate panicles or racemes.

• Fruits flattened, 5–8 mm, red, shiny.

• Seeds 2–3.

• Habitat Moist woods, talus slopes, streamsides, ditches, wet areas.

• Flowering May through August.

• Native: Yes.

Source: Oregon Flora Project

Red Columbine (Aquilegia formosa)

Great for attracting pollinators!

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Aquilegia formosa

red columbine

Description:

• Upright plant with spreading branches

• Basal and lower stem leaves on petioles are 1 to 12 inches long, divided 2 or 3 times; upper leaves sessile (attached directly by its base without a stalk) or nearly so.

• Flowers are nodding, bright red, with some yellow; 5 straight to inward-curved spurs with rounded tips

• Very attractive to hummingbirds and butterflies

• Closely resembles the eastern red columbine, A. canadensis.

• Rarity: Common

• Flowering Time: All Spring And Summer

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 8 to 48 inches

• Habitat: Coastal, Meadow, West-Side Forest, East-Side Forest, Subalpine, in moist, open to partly shaded areas from coastline to subalpine meadows

• Found In: Olympic Np, Mt. Rainier Np, N Cascades Np, Crater Lake Np, Wallowas, Steens, West Gorge, Siskiyous

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest

Additional resource: Oregon Flora Project

Bleeding Heart (Dicentra formosa)

The latin name "formosa" means "beautiful" , and is fitting for the plant’s delicate, heart-shaped flowers and lacy, fern-like foliage.

Bleeding hearts reseed themselves and can be quite prolific!

Dicentra formosa

Pacific bleeding heart

Description:

• Leaves: numerous fern-like segments with rounded edges, and often with a bluish, waxy coating.

• Flowers: pink, heart-shaped blossoms with flared tips grow on upright stems and hang in clusters above foliage.

• All parts of this plant are poisonous!

• Rarity: Locally Common

• Flowering Time: All Spring

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 6 to 20 inches

• Habitat: Coastal, Meadow, West-Side Forest grows in damp shaded places or near large rocks

• Found In: Siskiyous, Olympic Np, Mt. Rainier Np, Crater Lake Np, N Cascades Np

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest

Additional resource: Oregon Flora Project

Vanilla Leaf (Achlys triphylla)

A beautiful ground cover plant that is not edible, despite the assumption from what the name might suggest. The foliage has a faint vanilla fragrance when dried. Look for large beds of Vanilla leaf covering the patches of the forest floor at Silver Falls.

Achlys triphylla

Vanilla leaf

Description:

• Spreading by underground roots, Vanilla Leaf has a single large, sweet-scented leaf that is divided into three leaflets with scalloped edges that resemble wings.

• The central leaflet is divided into 3 lobes, the leaves are horizontal. single-stem, longer than leaf.

• It holds spike of small white flowers with long stamens giving a starry look.

• The berries are a reddish-purple.

• Similar to Achlys. californica, “deer foot”, which has 6 to 8 lobes on central leaflet, and brown berries.

• Called vanilla leaf for the sweet smell of the dried leaves.

• The fragrant leaves can reportedly act as an insect repellant when dried!

• Rarity: Common

• Flowering Time: Early Spring-Mid Summer

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 8 to 16 inches

• Habitat: Coastal, West-Side Forest

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest

More resources:

• Oregon Flora Project

Red Elderberry (Sambucus racemosa)

Taken late July 2024

Sambucus racemosa

Red elderberry

Description:

• A fast-growing large shrub

• The profuse sprays of white flowers on the red elderberry mature into large clusters of red berries that contrast beautifully against the pinnately compound leaves (leaves that are divided into smaller leaflets that grow on either side of a stem)

• The berries are consumed by birds but must be cooked before human consumption

• Rarity: Locally common

• Flowering time: Early Summer

• Life cycle: Perennial

• Height 6 to 18 feet

• Habitat: Coastal, West-Side Forest

• Found in: Mt. Rainier Np, Olympic Np, West Gorge, N Cascades Np

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest

Additional resource: Oregon Flora Project

Pacific Ninebark (Physocarpus capitatus)

• Deciduous shrub with thin brown bark shredding into many layers on older wood.

• Leaves 1 to 2 inches long, with petioles of about 3/4 inch, 3 to 5-lobed and toothed, shiny green above.

• Inflorescence is a round snowball-like cluster. Flowers more or less 1/2 inch across, with 5 white rounded petals, many stamens, hairs divided like a star on the calyx (green leaf-like tissue surrounding the flower)

• Rarity: Locally Common

• Flowering Time: Late Spring, Early Summer

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 6 to 12 feet

• Habitat: West-Side Forest, Coastal, moist places such as streambanks, riverbanks north-facing slopes, edges of forests, at low to mid-elevations

• Found In: Siskiyous, West Gorge, N Cascades Np, Mt. Rainier Np, Olympic Np

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest

Additional resource: Oregon Flora Project

Pacific Starflower (Trientalis borealis)

The stem is so thin it appears the blossom is hovering in mid air!

Trientalis borealis

pacific starflower

Description:

• Stems 4-20 cm.

• Leaves mostly whorled at stem apex, some alternate on proximal stem; blades of distal leaves lanceolate to lanceolate-elliptic, (proximal leaves abruptly much smaller, scale-like), apex acute to acuminate. Pedicels (a small stalk bearing an individual flower) shorter than leaves, usually sparsely stipitate-glandular (having glands that are on stalks). Flowers: corolla white, 5.5-8(-10) mm, lobes ovate to narrowly lanceolate, apex acute to acuminate

• Rarity: locally common

• Flowering time: late Spring to early Summer

• life cycle: Perennial

• Height: 4 to 8 inches

• Habitat: Coastal, West-Side Forest

• Found in: West Gorge, Mt. Rainier Np, N Cascades Np, Olympic Np, Crater Lake Np

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest

Additional Resource: Oregon Flora Project

False Solomon's Seal (Maianthemum racemosum)

One of the few fragrant flowers native to Silver Falls! False Solomon’s Seal can be distinguished from Solomon’s Seal by the feather-like blossoms at the end of the stems rather than blooms along the underside of the stem.

• Stem upright, unbranched, usually arched with cluster of flowers at end, showy flowers and berries

• Leaves alternate, sessile or clasping stem, oblong with pointed tips, 3 to 8 inches long, hairless above.

• Flowers are 20 or more, small, white, in tight panicle 2 to 5 inches long. Berries are green with brown mottling when young, turning bright red with age.

• Similar but smaller M. stellatum has flowers held in small raceme with 10 or fewer flowers, berries dark blue to reddish black.

• Rarity: Common

• Flowering Time: Mid Spring

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 12 to 37 inches

• Habitat: Moist Woods , Sea Leavel To Mid Elevations, Coastal, West-Side Forest Grows in moist places in forests at low to mid-elevations.

• Found In: Alaska To Ca, Olympic Np, Mt. Rainier Np, N Cascades Np, Crater Lake Np, Wallowas, Steens, Siskiyous, West Gorge

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest

Additional resource: Oregon Flora Project

Inside-out Flower (Vancouveria hexandra)

This low growing ground cover plant is also called Duckfeet because the leaves are shaped like duck’s feet. The tiny flowers are some of the most interesting as they are designed inside-out.

Spreading from underground stems. Long basal stems hold pinnately compound deciduous leaves, with 3 leaflets in each of 2–3 divisions. Leaflets square to heart-shaped, top surface hairless, slightly hairy underneath, stem turning light in color with age. Flower stalk hairless, above leaves, bearing whorls of long-stalked, small, white, nodding flowers. Flowers in parts of 6, petals bent backward, flared out, looking inside out. Grows in deep shade in conifer forests at low to mid-elevations. The taller redwood ivy, V. planipetala, with hairy flower stalks, grows in California, southern Oregon. Siskiyou inside-out flower, V. chrysantha, in the Siskiyou Mountains, has yellow flowers.

• Rarity: Locally Common

• Flowering Time: Early Summer

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 8--16 inches

• Habitat: Coastal, West-Side Forest

• Found In: West Gorge, Crater Lake Np, Olympic Np, Mt. Rainier Np, N Cascades Np, Siskiyous

• Native: Yes

Source: Spreading from underground stems. Long basal stems hold pinnately compound deciduous leaves, with 3 leaflets in each of 2–3 divisions. Leaflets square to heart-shaped, top surface hairless, slightly hairy underneath, stem turning light in color with age. Flower stalk hairless, above leaves, bearing whorls of long-stalked, small, white, nodding flowers. Flowers in parts of 6, petals bent backward, flared out, looking inside out. Grows in deep shade in conifer forests at low to mid-elevations. The taller redwood ivy, V. planipetala, with hairy flower stalks, grows in California, southern Oregon. Siskiyou inside-out flower, V. chrysantha, in the Siskiyou Mountains, has yellow flowers.

• Rarity: Locally Common

• Flowering Time: Early Summer

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 8--16 inches

• Habitat: Coastal, West-Side Forest

• Found In: West Gorge, Crater Lake Np, Olympic Np, Mt. Rainier Np, N Cascades Np, Siskiyous

• Native: Yes

Source: https://www.pnwflowers.com/flower/vancouveria-hexandra

Additional resource: https://oregonflora.org/taxa/index.php?taxon=9042

Rose Checkermallow (Sidalcea malviflora)

Fairy Lanterns (Prosartes smithii)

Pacific Rhododendron (Rhododendron macrophyllum)

Source: Large shrub with erect and spreading branches and thick twigs. Leaves evergreen, 3–8 in. long, oblong, leathery, entire, with sunken midvein, upper side dark green. Flowers pink to rose-purple, 1–1 1/2 in.; 5 petals fused at base form a wide shallow bell with tips spreading wide. Grows in moist to dry coniferous forests from coast to high elevations. State flower of Washington.

• Rarity: Locally Common

• Flowering Time: Late Spring, Early Summer

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 3--15 feet

• Habitat: West-Side Forest, Coastal

• Found In: West Gorge, Olympic Np

• Native: Yes

Source: https://www.pnwflowers.com/flower/rhododendron-macrophyllum

Additional resource: https://oregonflora.org/taxa/index.php?taxon=7850

Largeleaf Avens (Geum macrophyllum)

This mid height perennial plant starts blooming in the spring and continues all summer long. Very common along the trails at Silver Falls State Park.

Geum macrophyllum

Larged-leaved avens

Description:

• Erect, hairy. Basal leaves with long erect petioles, a more or less heart-shaped terminal leaflet many times larger than the variously sized small leaflets below;

• stem leaves usually sessile, deeply lobed to 3 lobes.

• Flowers 3–10 at top, with 5 nearly round yellow petals, many stamens.

• Grows in streambanks, edges of woods, moist meadows, usually at low elevations, but can grow to subalpine.

• Variation macrophyllum with the terminal leaflet of basal leaves shallowly lobed, all leaves finely toothed.

• Variation perincisum grows east of Cascades, has terminal leaflet of basal leaf more deeply lobed.

• Rarity: Common

• Flowering Time: All of Spring And Summer

• Life Cycle: Perennial

• Height: 1 to 3 feet

• Habitat: Meadow, West-Side Forest, East-Side Forest, Moist Riverbanks

• Found In: Olympic Np, Mt. Rainier Np, N Cascades Np, Crater Lake Np, Wallowas, Steens, Siskiyous, West Gorge

• Native: Yes

Source: Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest

Additional resource: Oregon Flora Project