Alberta Wanderings

Another bike ride, June 28, last year; Only about 6 1/2 miles from home, but on a road I would never have had any reason to go on if not for botanising!
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/June282010APrimrosesSparrowSEg...

The ride is pleasant, with some wildflowers along the way, but no big concentrations until arriving at the main site--one of the first sites I found (stumbled on) when I started riding around local back roads on 2009: one of those unassuming little patches of roadside (ditch, in local speech) that just happens to be much richer in species than most spots.
Adjacent to the road is a fenced area, presumably used to graze cattle for at least part of the year, a mixed wooded area, with semi-wooded wet land and some open grassy wet area.

This habitat all extends into the ditch, although growth in the ditch in this spot tends to be a bit less lush, probably due to soil disturbance from the road building (not recent) leaving it with a less organic soil.

When I first visited this site, I found dried flowers of our local mealy primrose, Primula incana, so one of my hopes for 2010 was to catch them in flower, and this visit was timed just right!

There is a sizable colony on one side of the road, more plants on the other side, and they also extend into the grassy area beyond the ditch.

A view of the foliage, and a pollinator!

Same site.
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/June282010APrimrosesSparrowSEg...

The primula is by no means rare, (it used to grow on the family farm until that area became too overgrown with woodies and taller forbs once grazing was decreased) but a more commonly seen plant, in similar wet grassy places (or just easier to find?) is Pedicularis groenlandica.
The fourth shot has an Eriophorum sp in the background.
     

An even more common plant--or genus, at any rate, I am just beginning to attempt to distinguish them-- is Platanthera/Habenaria. This one could be Platanthera viridis?, owing to apparent bracts; I will have to do a new set of photos of this common genus here, knowing some of the distinguishing characters!

Also widespread and common are numerous sedges and allies such as cottongrasses; Here, presumed Carex aurea, and an Eriophorum sp.

Same site:
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/June282010APrimrosesSparrowSEg...

A few scattered things, one of our tallish Erigeron sp common to damp grassy places

the always delightful Sisyrinchium montanum

and a choice willow, Salix sp; not one of our most common  I don't know how large this gets,  I've seen a couple smallish ones, but they may have been grazed or cut, I'll have to keep watching, and will probably try to find some cuttings and/or next year

Stellaria sp, delicate things found in grassy/damp places..

Less common, I was excited to find Cypripedium passerinum at this site--only a couple of plants, but they likely occur farther away from the road as well. Plants were quite small--young? or less happy than where I have seen them farther west in an extensive colony of robust plants. From my limited experience, they seem to like damp/wet conditions in semi-shade--perhaps this site is more exposed than they prefer? Just a couple of crappy shots, sorry.. I'll have to dig up photos from the other site sometime..

https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/June282010APrimrosesSparrowSEg...

Last set for this stop, starting with the very common (going from full sun to deep shade, as long as the soil is at least somewhat moist) Geum rivale, here with the more compact form of plants growing in sun--fairly compact golden green basal foliage, compared to bluer, lusher foliage in shade, flowering stems still fairly tall (60cm at a wild guess) but not  as tall and flopping as in shade..

Fourth shot shows primula in background, last shows a flower heading to seed...

This final plant is a bit of a mystery to me (I have yet to see if the Flora will illuminate it..). It seems similar to our common Pyrola asarifolia?, but has conspicuous raised veining on the leaves, which generally seem smaller, and flowers maybe just a touch darker (though they don't stay as dark as buds seen in some of these shots); I have only seen this form in wet semi/wooded areas, here it is growing along the fenceline, under/near small trees where the more open ditch transitions to open woodland on the other side of the fence..

Nice series Cohan, the photos really convey the habitat in which the plants are found growing.  Regarding Pyrola asarifolia, I'm surprised it can survive in such a competitive environment with grasses. 

I checked the USDA Plant Profile for Pyrola asarifolia, and there are two subspecies listed, with ssp. asarifolia found throughout much of the US and Canada.  I suspect with such a huge distribution, the plant is variable.  I don't know the distinction between ssp. asarifolia and the northwestern ssp. bracteata.
http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=PYAS

The Burke Museum of Natural History site is a great resource, some excellent photos of this Pyrola there.  Some photos show much more textured leaves than others, so this must be one of its variable characteristics.
Pyrola asarifolia ssp. asarifolia:
http://biology.burke.washington.edu/herbarium/imagecollection.php?Genus=...

Pyrola asarifolia ssp. bracteata:
http://biology.burke.washington.edu/herbarium/imagecollection.php?Genus=...

My first encounter with P. asarifolia was when I lived near Seattle, Washington (even though this species is also native to my Massachusetts home).  I potted up a couple pieces, barely anything you'd call roots at all, just the long horizontal threads that "pose as roots" and run under the woodland duff.  It was potted in a wide low bowl-shaped clay container, with light duffy soil and topdressed with pine needles, and keep moderately moist.  I was amazed, the pot quickly filled up with lots of rosettes and flowers, and made for a fetching container for the 4 years I lived there; ultimately I gave it away when I moved back east.

Catching up here...Cohan, your photos of Primula incana are so informative for me, and tell me why I failed with this species.  I see that it needs SUN and moisture!  I was growing it in shade, and it could be I lost it due to conditions much drier than it needs.  The flowers are so cute, not a show-stopper, but I like such demure understated plants.  Nice shots, I like the one with the bee :D

McDonough wrote:

Nice series Cohan, the photos really convey the habitat in which the plants are found growing.  Regarding Pyrola asarifolia, I'm surprised it can survive in such a competitive environment with grasses. 

I checked the USDA Plant Profile for Pyrola asarifolia, and there are two subspecies listed, with ssp. asarifolia found throughout much of the US and Canada.  I suspect with such a huge distribution, the plant is variable.  I don't know the distinction between ssp. asarifolia and the northwestern ssp. bracteata.
http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=PYAS

The Burke Museum of Natural History site is a great resource, some excellent photos of this Pyrola there.  Some photos show much more textured leaves than others, so this must be one of its variable characteristics.
Pyrola asarifolia ssp. asarifolia:
http://biology.burke.washington.edu/herbarium/imagecollection.php?Genus=...

Pyrola asarifolia ssp. bracteata:
http://biology.burke.washington.edu/herbarium/imagecollection.php?Genus=...

My first encounter with P. asarifolia was when I lived near Seattle, Washington (even though this species is also native to my Massachusetts home).  I potted up a couple pieces, barely anything you'd call roots at all, just the long horizontal threads that "pose as roots" and run under the woodland duff.  It was potted in a wide low bowl-shaped clay container, with light duffy soil and topdressed with pine needles, and keep moderately moist.  I was amazed, the pot quickly filled up with lots of rosettes and flowers, and made for a fetching container for the 4 years I lived there; ultimately I gave it away when I moved back east.

Thanks for the comments, Mark, you prompted me to finally do some digging in the Flora and online; I will still need to go look carefully at specific characters in season, but based on photos it seems likeliest to be just variations in P. asarifolia-- all other possibilities do not seem to have sufficiently blunt leaves.. nor did I see any white/ish flowers on these, but that seems to be variable.. The odd thing is that this form seems visibly distinct from the more common P asarifolia forms, here, and specific to these wettish semi-wooded places; maybe its an environmentally caused difference in appearance, but I have doubts, as the usual smooth leaf form is found in a lot of places; I'll have to keep looking in the future, and see if I am just mis-observing the distinction...
Here are two pics side by side to compare--it may  be that I am just imagining a distinction, but in person they feel more different than they seem here...
"Regular" form

"Special form" this is a different locale than those posted earlier, and this is a roadside recently cleared of woody plants, so the temptation is to say that this is just what P asarifolium looks like when it gets sunburned, as this one clearly is, but I'm sure I have seen this in intact habitats where it still feels different than the regular form.. I will need to keep documenting this year....

McDonough wrote:

Catching up here...Cohan, your photos of Primula incana are so informative for me, and tell me why I failed with this species.  I see that it needs SUN and moisture!  I was growing it in shade, and it could be I lost it due to conditions much drier than it needs.  The flowers are so cute, not a show-stopper, but I like such demure understated plants.  Nice shots, I like the one with the bee :D

Mark, this species definitely grows in spots that are at least seasonally damp to wet, here; I imagine they could take drier conditions, at least for the later summer, since there are years when all but the wettest parts of our wetlands are dry in mid-late summer, but probably not a dry spot in your hot dry summer weather. Recent years (3 or 4) have been much wetter than typical, with water standing in places I only would have expected it in spring, growing up...
I expect the moisture might be more important than full sun, since it does have tall grasses etc around it--it is a species that has disappeared or mainly so, from the overgrown (with woody species and tall ungrazed forbs) from wet areas on the family farm where it used to grow, but that is likely both shade and overcompetition..I haven't tried this yet in the garden, seeds have been scarce to non-existent (likely they disperse quickly...)

Cohan, I really like your wanderings! Some of the plants I am familiar with, but most of them are new to me - the species, not the genera!

Thanks, Trond! I have to admit I am jealous of those who come from areas with a lot of endemism--many of our local species occur over vast natural ranges (often without much visible variation!) --but I guess that's cool in its own way  ;D
Anyway, I think its always neat to see the habitat where someone else lives/travels and see how it's different or the same!
I've been slowly catching up on your old posts esp in the garden walks thread, and nice to see for sure both your nature and nurture :) Fun to see both related and completely new plants...

Back to the present!
A photo set from the woods on the edge of the farm, just past my acreage boundary;
This is where I have been cutting firewood for the last week or two..
Textures and colours of bark, lichens, moss, fungi etc..
Full album: https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/March132011ForestTextures#

The first photos are all birches: presumably all Betula papyrifera; varying in colour from one tree to another, even various trunks/branches on the same tree..

Fungi

Lichens and moss, latter showing Populus balsamifera trunk..

Nice gallery Cohan; the selection here and your picasaweb gallery, you have a good eye for photographs and composition. In spite of the cold lingering winter where you are, there's a pleasing coppery warmth to the photos.  :)

Thanks, Mark-- I have to find what I can at this time of year..lol..That was a fairly sunny day, so there was a nice bit of glow..
Trees, in any kind of detail, I still find a challenging subject, but I was quite happy with these trunk shots..portraits of more of the tree at once, I still need to work on....

Okay, I think I'm not going to worry about being perfectly chronological, or I may never get anything posted ;)
A few images from May 05, my first find this year of Petasites, our first wild flower, usually..
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/May052011FirstWildFlowers#
The first I found were just up the road, and some appeared to have been open possibly a week or more...
We seem to have P sagittatus, and P frigidus v palmatus, as well as intermediates, sometimes growing together.. I'm trying to watch sites this year to compare flowers to leaf forms --not always easy, as leaves are undeveloped when flowers start.. my feeling is that flowers vary little between the forms, but considerably within them... some have considerable purple on buds/backs of flower heads and cream to purple within the disk flowers, others all white; flower heads also vary from a mix of male and female flowers to mostly/all one or the other..(royer/dickinson says mixed or all female..)

Butterburs are charming plants, at least the flowers. I can be without the leaves of most species. . . But I have not dared to plant any in my garden ;)

I guess you'd need quite a bit of space for them in the garden..lol--I'd like to try some plantings, but I can give them many metres space...
Actually i really like the leaves of the ones we have here-- the arrow leaf type can get large, to 30cm long, and I like the way they stand straight up, and also like the white hairs on them..
In fact, though I like the flowers--mostly on immature stalks- the plant is flashiest when the leaves and seeding stalks are at full size--you can see them from far away, unlike the flowers!
We also have what I presume to be P frigidus palmatus, with palmate leaves which are super common in woodlands here, but rarely flower, and I like these just for the palmate leaves--usually not too big 10 cm or so, but can be bigger...

From the same walk on May 05; same album:
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/May052011FirstWildFlowers#
A view of the roadside wet area (we call it 'slough' like all wet areas that aren't big enough to call lakes--marsh/bog/fen/swamp--those are not vernacular here...lol) which is cut in two by the road.. usually deep enough to hold some standing water all year, with marshy areas around...

Several willows and a happy pollinator..

Same day, same album, but off the road and out onto the farm..
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/May052011FirstWildFlowers#

Another Salix, this time female flowers

Just emerging Caltha palustris, no flowers yet that day.. Ranunculus sp, and Rumex sp

Several views of pasture areas on the farm; most of this standing water will not last, though depending on rain, some spots will have water all year, and many will remain damp/wet..

A couple more road views from May 17, same day as last view I posted in Image of the Day..

Cool shots Cohan, we never have those straight-as-an-arrow highway views here, our roads are more like spaghetti. The Salix bloom closeups are most artistic, I have looked at these closely several times, close attention to details is one of the joys of gardening and nature, thanks for sharing these :)

McDonough wrote:

Cool shots Cohan, we never have those straight-as-an-arrow highway views here, are roads are more like spaghetti. The Salix bloom closeups are most artistic, I have looked at these closely several times, close attention to details is one of the joys of gardening and nature, thanks for sharing these :)

Thanks, Mark--except for occasional roads near rivers (not that many around here) or until you get to the mountains, straight roads are definitely the norm here!

I have some more spring flower shots coming up, and many of them are macro views-- Shepherdia, Geocaulon, Violas--many flowers that must be seen very close-up to appreciate at all...lol

McDonough wrote:

Cool shots Cohan, we never have those straight-as-an-arrow highway views here, our roads are more like spaghetti. The Salix bloom closeups are most artistic, I have looked at these closely several times, close attention to details is one of the joys of gardening and nature, thanks for sharing these :)

Mark, you know why the catkins like the polar bear fur has a light colour outermost and a dark interior?

In Norway I don't think we even have one mile straight roads!

Looks like Sweden...

Stephenb wrote:

Looks like Sweden...

Still alive Stephen; have you tasted the Senecio?

Stephenb wrote:

Looks like Sweden...

I guess there should be many parts that look similar to Northern Europe--especially here around the boreal forest zone--half our species are 'circumboreal'!

Hoy wrote:

Stephenb wrote:

Looks like Sweden...

Still alive Stephen; have you tasted the Senecio?

You don't get rid of me that quickly! Senecio poisoning is a cumulative effect.... I doubt that the dosage from the two plants you gave me is sufficient.... (NB! this is a commonly wild foraged plant in Japan).

In English it's called the Aleutian Ragwort and as such is included in the Flora of North America:
http://www.efloras.org/florataxon.aspx?flora_id=1&taxon_id=200024464
Perhaps you'd like to check your plants against the key? Mine probably won't flower until next year!

Stephen, it seems to fit the description quite well. And it is sure it isn't th common ragwort ;D

May 31, a 'sprint' into the mountains ( I call these daytrips that because we usually cover a lot of ground, and so not too much time is spent at any one stop)..
This trip was about 525km round trip, taking about 13 hours including a quick breakfast and fueling stop in Rocky Mountain House, and another short stop there for a couple of grocery items on the way home.. of that time, about 6.5 hours were spent driving, and the rest divided among  10 or so stops (not going back to count the sites right now...lol)....

Spring was late this year, and snowfalls heavy in many areas, although much of May was warm, so I wasn't sure what I would find floristically, but many sites came through with hoped for or unexpected finds!

First full album:
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...
Things were green here in the 'lowlands'--just near home, and just past Rocky Mtn House

Always good to get those first views of the mountains....

The road (Highway 11/ David Thompson Highway, which extends from the Banff- Jasper Highway /Icefields Parkway junction, past home and on east through the city of Red Deer where we often shop) past Rocky Mtn House and into the foothills and mountains, is mercifully nearly empty on a late May weekday, and seems endless, as are the views!

More animal life seen this time than we usually have--from the common-- deer, to the not so often seen domestic animals which roadsigns warn you to watch for! To more 'wilderness' animals, seen later..

The seemingly 'bare' grassy and gravelly roadsides along into the foothills seem uninteresting speeding past (apart from seasons and times when patches of colour may catch your eye) but in fact there are many nice plants, which no doubt get space to grow due to roadbuilding and maintenance have deforested this strip, and keeping some of it bare...
Just starting at this time of year to grow and flower....

https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

The usual players: Arctostaphylos uva-ursi   Dryas drummondii         Artemisia sp          Antennaria sp

Some early flowers: Dryas            Oxytropis sericea?                  Arctostaphylos                      Astragalus sp?

Ah, what the heck..... Taraxacum;     the site.....

A short stop at the viewpoint along Abraham Lake..

https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

many things not yet in flower, but I did see this species I have not before (that I remember!) Arabis species??

Another cress;

Views just before (note: most views, unless taken from plant stops, are taken from the moving vehicle, through the glass) and from the stop..

A second stop along Abraham Lake, this little area is the foot of a mountain, which has been cut off by the road passing through..

This is the site where I photographed the Eriogonum last fall; There were several familiar and unexpected things in flower...
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

I found some Androsace chamaejasme flowering here even late in the year, but this seemed to be their peak.. they occur in rock crevices, gravel patches as well as grassy areas with more soil...

At first I thought the Dryas were not yet in flower, but many were! I think this is Dryas integrifolia but could be wrong...

Here's the Eriogonum, which was discussed on this site earlier in the year (have to dig up the link) and I think it was settled on Eriogonum androsaceum .. almost missed it in this season, much harder to find than in its fall colours! Note the tiny crucifer to the left of the first image... more on that later...

Someone's been raiding the Arctostaphylos uva-ursi flowers! (second image)

The surprise of this stop was this Potentilla sp At first I only saw some leaves and buds, but then!

This small sedge seemed to be making its own mounds of humusy soil-- presumably its own decomposed foliage and trapped blowing soil etc..

Viola adunca  another species flowering across a range of altitudes

Nice to see some bloom from out in that neck of the woods!

Thanks for the show, Cohan.  Everything looks so fresh and clean... 

In the first pic of Dryas, what kind of spruce are in the background by the lake?

Thanks, Lori-- I was pleased to see there was even some bloom higher up than these photos ( I think I've estimated-based on reading something- that it should be around 1200m around the lake, so not very high)..soon to come....

Rick, I have to admit I haven't examined the trees closely enough to say too much... I think the only options for spruce are Picea mariana (which at a really superficial look I'd say they don't look like, and probably too dry a habitat) P glauca, and P engelmannii comes into the mix somewhere in subalpine areas (we only have the other two, so I know nothing about engelmannii), with hybrids between it and glauca as well

They're Englemann spruce, or hybrids of same with white spruce - the narrow spires are characteristic.  (The elevation is too low for subalpine firs - which are also spire-like - and I have never seen them in that sort of habitat.  The trees in the photo don't have the distinctive characteristics of black spruce, either.... and come to think of it, the habitat doesn't look too apt for black spruce either.)

Same site, new album
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

This tiny thing was new to me-- I first saw some yellow buds behind other plants--a plant so small, it looked tiny behind Androsace chamaejasme!

And with a fingertip for scale--this is an extra small one, but even the larger clumps no more than a couple of inches across...

Then I saw more, in flower, but I'm not certain whether these were all the same species (haven't tried keying yet, and will probably find I didn't record the right details..lol)--some with quite linear leaves and at least one with very Physaria like leaves..... (so small, I didn't see that pebble in the middle of it!)

Close-crop view of texture and buds-- I guess the dark ones are fertilised flowers?

Skulski wrote:

They're Englemann spruce, or hybrids of same with white spruce - the narrow spires are characteristic.  (The elevation is too low for subalpine firs - which are also spire-like - and I have never seen them in that sort of habitat.  The trees in the photo don't have the distinctive characteristics of black spruce, either.... and come to think of it, the habitat doesn't look too apt for black spruce either.)

Thanks for the input, Lori.. I have no knowledge of the trees outside my immediate area...lol.. I agree the site is much drier than any I would expect for black spruce (Picea mariana) though I might not have known that if this were my only visit--everything was wet this year, every spot we stopped!

The other cress at that site was a white flowered species, still low growing, but not nearly as small as the first, though it can flower on small plants...
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

Last set from this site, some views and mountain sheep, which we always see evidence of (poops!) rarely see the animals themselves
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

... this montane area is key for wildlife in winter, since snowfall is generally shallow on the grassy Kootenay Plains..
Not shy at all, this little herd was only maybe 30-40 metres from where we parked (no other people around) and paid not the slightest attention as we wandered around for quite a while (never in their direction, below the parking area, we only went up)

Several views showing the various substrates around the site, and surroundings....

Part of the parking/roadway, an overview of the cleft carved in the mountain to let the road pass through, and a view toward the site from the previous viewpoint on the lake--in the lower centre of the image, you see the highway curve into the dark cleft, while a small gravel road goes off to the left; it curves around that hill, and the site is much more extensive than it seems in its context of massive landscape features!

Interesting landscape, plants and animals, Cohan! The small yellow was a nice one. The dark "flowers" are seedpods I think.
Seems you can keep a higher speed than I can when driving here. What is the speed limits of the roads there?

Hoy wrote:

Interesting landscape, plants and animals, Cohan! The small yellow was a nice one. The dark "flowers" are seedpods I think.
Seems you can keep a higher speed than I can when driving here. What is the speed limits of the roads there?

Thanks, Trond... yes, that's what I thought-- fertilised flowers, though I think they are some time away from ripe seeds..
Speeds depend on roads-- our gravel back roads have no posted speeds, and since I am not a driver, I have not looked it up...but you'd have an interesting ride over 80km an hour on the gravel roads...lol
Regular highways around here are 100km/h, some smaller ones may be 80 or 90, and the big highway between Edmonton and Calgary, the two largest cities in the province is 110km/h.. unfortunately most people speed, and 120-130 is typical, even on the highways that are 100km/h..

In the mountains, that wide empty highway that we take to Banff Park boundary (same highway we take to work, but its not as wide and much much busier here) has a speed limit of 100km/h, but it is wide and easy, with only some big hills, not many sharp curves or sudden inclines.. Once on the Icefields Parkway, which is narrower, it's 90km/h and less in the more extreme sections-- 60/50km/h..that's in 'summer' driving conditions (its never really summer at the highest sections) we don't go on that highway in winter, large sections have 'no stopping, avalanche zone' signs.. doesn't inspire confidence...

You certainly live in a country with better roads (maybe you have more space to make roads ;D)! Here the speed limit usually is 80km/h but that doesn't mean we can keep that speed for long stretches!

Maybe that means you have fewer traffic accidents? People here drive like maniacs, generally! And all the while talking on the phone, texting, etc etc.. small wonder you see deer smeared all over the road all the time--they go too fast, don't pay attention, and have no time to react.. not that I have an opinion....lol

Lis wrote:

That Taraxacum is interesting. Might be T. ceratophorum. Not Your Mother's dandilion! Dandies are interesting plants. They do not need fertilization to produce viable seeds, in fact they are never fertilized. As a result there is little genetic variation, but what there is has led to identifiable clones and races. Some think there are many species or sub-species, others think they are all just different forms. Very cool.

Nice trip - your pictures made me miss the Rockies for a few minutes, Cohan. I lived in Calgary for 4 years and the best thing about the place was the nearby mountains.

Thanks, Lis-- I know there are some other dandelion species at high altitudes, but haven't made any attempts to figure out which are which...lol
I do know many of these composite species have those confusing self-fertilising clones, Antennaria is another one, and Trond has mentioned Hieracium in his part of the world..
I still have many more photos from this trip to post, including some more dandelions from much higher up....I think what I posted so far is from the foothills, not very high up at all...
It is great to be able to get into the mountains though my access isn't nearly so fast as in Calgary-- I can be in fairly wild areas within a half hour driving, but an hour at least to get to the actual foothills, and probably another hour to get any real altitude... Its all lovely on the way out, though it seems really long coming home...lol

cohan wrote:

...an hour at least to get to the actual foothills, and probably another hour to get any real altitude...

Well, yes, assuming that the highway is both the means of getting there and is pretty much at the level of the destination, more-or-less.  If not, though... once the car is abandoned at the trailhead, it's another half hour or more to get out of sight and sound of the highway, then another hour or more to get to the start of the really good stuff!!  ;D  ;D

Skulski wrote:

cohan wrote:

...an hour at least to get to the actual foothills, and probably another hour to get any real altitude...

Well, yes, assuming that the highway is both the means of getting there and is pretty much at the level of the destination, more-or-less.  If not, though... once the car is abandoned at the trailhead, it's another half hour or more to get out of sight and sound of the highway, then another hour or more to get to the start of the really good stuff!!  ;D  ;D

My driver is mainly interested in scenery, not plants, so he usually gets all he wants without venturing too far from the vehicle, which means my excursions out of the vehicle can't be too time consuming...lol..
I think he might be coaxed out for a nice trail ( there are supposed to be some in the Nordegg area where you can get somewhat high) but I don't think he'd be coaxed to leave the vehicle unattended for any length of time, nor to slog through bush for more than a few minutes...lol.. Another factor is busy-ness-- a lot of our out of the way stops feature no other humans at all, which is great, but if there is even one other car there its probably too busy for my friend (no good pointing out the unlikeliness of running into them if the trail has any length or forks!)... Since we already live in the country, getting away from people is to a different standard--our one neighbour at less than  a half mile is audible (tractors etc on occasion) but not really visible, so at home we see no other people at all; the Icefields Parkway, ironically, is full of people by our standards.. this trip was not bad at all, though even still the Columbia Icefield tourist area was busy!

cohan wrote:

My driver is mainly interested in scenery, not plants, so he usually gets all he wants without venturing too far from the vehicle, which means my excursions out of the vehicle can't be too time consuming...lol..
I think he might be coaxed out for a nice trail ( there are supposed to be some in the Nordegg area where you can get somewhat high) but I don't think he'd be coaxed to leave the vehicle unattended for any length of time, nor to slog through bush for more than a few minutes...lol.. Another factor is busy-ness-- a lot of our out of the way stops feature no other humans at all, which is great, but if there is even one other car there its probably too busy for my friend (no good pointing out the unlikeliness of running into them if the trail has any length or forks!)... Since we already live in the country, getting away from people is to a different standard--our one neighbour at less than  a half mile is audible (tractors etc on occasion) but not really visible, so at home we see no other people at all; the Icefields Parkway, ironically, is full of people by our standards.. this trip was not bad at all, though even still the Columbia Icefield tourist area was busy!

No, it's not the least bit ironic!  I don't think anyone would argue that the whole highway tract, including townsites, stops off the highway and the popular funnel-the-crowds-through "must-see" scenic hikes all through the mountain parks, is not a madhouse!!   :o
(But, honestly, getting off the highway and expending some effort is, thankfully, how you lose the crowds and often see no one at all... Also, I'm certainly not complaining that people don't get out in the backcountry... I GREATLY prefer it that way!  ;))  Anyway, far off-topic...  :)

I think the third photo (and maybe others?) in this set http://nargs.org/smf/index.php?topic=591.msg9580#msg9580 might be Lesquerella arenosa or arctica??

That's one of the joys of the David Thompson highway--far less busy than the national parks! We are lucky that we can go on weekdays, also, though that makes less difference in mid-summer
Someone locally mentioned Mount Baldy as being an alpine flower destination, I think that's at Nordegg, so I should look into access....
Yes, best that not so many people get into the back country--the long in-walks to the alpine zones are a great protector, no doubt--though even at the Columbia Icefield with hundreds of cars parked, many walk straight up the trail to the ice, but a mere handful wander around among the moraines below, and most of those few just to stand on top for views--down between them where most of the plants are, no one is around!
The back-country closer to home, apparently, is not so lucky-my brother lives a bit south and west of here (near Caroline) and his land borders on a river, and, I think, crown (government) land--he has people tracking across his land to get to the river, occupying a shed, etc etc, and in Rocky you see huge numbers of people heading west with quads (all terrain vehicles) seems a sad way to interact with nature--driving over it and churning it into mud :(
Still, between Rocky Mountain House and the Saskatchewan River Crossing, we see very few people, and those mostly clustered in a few campgrounds etc...

Thanks for the tip on Lesquerella, I had that kind of vaguely in mind as a possibility, though I know very little about those little crucifers!

Okay, back at it!
Leaving Abraham Lake, the highway continues on through the Kootenay Plains, into Banff National Park;
full album: https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

A stop I've made before, by a small 'lake' where just a bit later the ground will be carpeted with tiny Primula mistassinica, dotted with Saxifraga aizoides, and others... This time, Primula only in bud, in small numbers, and Sax just emerging...

The lake, the grass giving way to woods beyond the water, and a closer view of the soil-- I believe this is what I see referred to in wildflower books when they say things like 'wet calcareous soil' as they do for P mistassinica.....

Full album:
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

This schoolbus was in front of us for a while, then pulled into a group campsite in the Kootenay Plains... after we'd continued on deep into the mountains and passed back through this area on the way home, we were on the trails at the nearby  Siffleur Falls Staging Area, when out of nowhere a pack of young teenagers on bicycles passed us! After, we saw them just up the road turning into the same campground--so that's who was on that bus!

This one is for Trond-- a very non-Norwegian highway!

Just because its one of the very few places on our route where we could stop for refreshments, we usually do stop at the Saskatchewan River Crossing, just at the junction of the David Thompson Highway and the Icefields Parkway, for some seriously overpriced (and under 'qualitied' ) cafeteria treats .... What a place to have a summer job though!

Continuing on and up--
full album: https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

The fresh greens of emerging leaves.....

Best not to think about all that rock and gravel poised above the road, with signs that warn  "No Stopping, Avalanche Zone"..biggest risk is no doubt in winter, when I absolutely don't travel here ;)

Finally the road climbs up, and up, and up! and levels out more or less, not too far from the tree line, and up in the snow zone.. there is a viewpoint to look back down where you have come from - an impressive view, which I have photographed in the past- but of course I'm busier running around looking for plants! I've seen some nice things around here, but its a bit early-- just Salix, and the two plants in flower on this day from home all the way up here-- Taraxacum and Fragaria! only on the sunny side of some gravel banks, still snow around in shade...

Continuing on to the Icefields..
(same album) https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

The snow is close here!

I always like seeing this stripey zebra mountains, though there is a bit more to the white stripes at this time of year!

Another one for Trond- highway still is not bad up here, though much narrower than the earlier road, and not easy to pass when you get a slow bus or RV in front of you that has a hard time on the inclines! Just slow down and enjoy the view :)

A tremendous landscape! And your roads are incredible :o

And no ferries on the whole trip!

Cohan, there's LOTS to study, envy and think about in those photos.  Like the grass fields by the lake: you mention Primula mistassinica growing in calareous soil...so is the lake water up there basic?  I suppose.  I never really thought about it until now.  Down here I have only seen the primula in what is at least mildly acidic conditions.  There is one place I know of where the primula habitat is similarly bathed in water from Lake Superior. 

RickR wrote:

Cohan, there's LOTS to study, envy and think about in those photos.  Like the grass fields by the lake: you mention Primula mistassinica growing in calareous soil...so is the lake water up there basic?  I suppose.  I never really thought about it until now.  Down here I have only seen the primula in what is at least mildly acidic conditions.  There is one place I know of where the primula habitat is similarly bathed in water from Lake Superior. 

Rick, I have to confess my knowledge of the soils and waters is limited at best,  I need to try to find a good book on the geology of the province! Meanwhile if I make any egregious errors, Lori can set me straight (obviously she doesn't know this site, but the Alberta Rockies in general) ;)... I have not yet looked up these species in Flora of Alberta to see what they say, but I have an old book: "Rocky Mountain Wildflowers" (Porsild) which says- "in wet calcareous soil by pond margins or in wet meadows" so it doesn't seem the calcareous sites are obligate.. Again, I am no expert on these soils, but this site seemed to me like it would be calcareous-- the soil is very  light in colour, mixed with gravel, and very little humus.. I assume at least some of this soil is rock flour from the mountains around, which should be (predominantly? entirely?) limestone...

Okay, still on May 31!

https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

We arrive at the Columbia Icefield, where the attraction is the glacier, with a massive tourist centre across the road (hotel, restaurants, gift shop, I think, I've never gone in, way too busy even on this weekday in late May (though doubtless much less busy than peak days), a trail that leads up to the glacier's edge ( the trail is kind of fun, great views, great rocks, and of course interesting to see the early colonising plants close to the glacier), but my interest is farther back, in among and on the moraines left behind by the gradual retreat of the glacier..
These plant communities seem to have arisen very slowly--despite being below the tree line, there are, at most, a few small stunted (spruce, fir?) and not even that in most of the area..
There are markers along the trail showing where the glacier was in which year, and I haven't worked it out exactly (nor do I know how evenly it retreated) but the century mark isn't too far from this area, and I think it must at least be many decades since this section was under the ice-- progress is slow!!

I wasn't sure if there would be much plant activity so early (there was still snow around, and other places where it had clearly melted recently) but I was hoping-- on a visit about a month later last year, there were things that had already finished flowering...
I was to be pleasantly surprised...

full album: https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

The most conspicuous plant at this time was Arctostaphylos (Arctous) rubra visible for some distance on the nearly bare gravel (some things not yet leafed out, or barely emerging)...

This is very funny-- on previous visites, I had admired the good sized mats of this plant, admiring this stemless (or nearly) willow with the beautiful leaves! I was never early enough till now to see flowers, nor apparently was I ever there at the right time for berries! So when I saw the sweet little creamy urn flowers, I was quite stunned... Of course to see it at this season must be among its finest moments, the spring colour was glorious... I have not been there for fall colour ( though I saw some Arctous in fall colour once across the parking lot, must have been A alpina, much smaller leaves, and I had not realised there were two alpine species, so never thought to question this plant)..
I now really want to grow this!

Some plants were later, with only flowers, leaves not yet showing, or just starting...

Thanks, I do love it too :) even in summer green the leaves are beautiful, now that I have seen spring colour and flowers, its even more wonderful, and probably looks great in fall too.. I'll be looking for seed sure.. unfortunately ( for me, not the place or plants!) this site is in a National Park, so no seed collecting possible (I might take one or two berries if there were tons of them, but that's in the unlikely event I get there at the right time!) , if I am lucky I might find it in the mountains outside the park, but not so many spots to easy access alpine areas there, I have to look into Mount Baldy, as I mentioned earlier, by Nordegg, much closer, but also drier mountains, so might be a very different flora...
Apart from that, I will be watching for it on seedlists! As for cultivation, I guess no way to know without trying!

Arctostaphylos rubra is a very handsome plant - and not unlike A. alpina, the only one native here. As you say, Cohan, you have to be early to catch it flowering but the berries last long and I can find berries in late Autumn (on alpina that is), presumeably rubra behave likevise ;D

Isn't it allowed to eat berries in the park? Then you can spit out some seeds ;)

Technically, I don't know if you are allowed to eat berries or not! But I don't think anyone would be too upset if I ate one or two..lol.. still I may or may not get to that area in fall.. I will still try to find it somewhere else, its not an uncommon plant, I think, but all the other locations may also be in the parks or even farther away! lol

same site: https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

Another surprise from this site-- I must have been here when this was in fruit, or near it, but if I noticed it (possibly not, small and scattered) I don't remember, should dig through old trip photos and see if I shot it...
So, this sweet little Anemone sp (haven't dug much yet, and leaves not fully emerged to help id, but my only guess so far is A lithophila)..surely the flora of this site is well known, maybe I should check for a book in that big tourist centre across the road!!
All plants I saw at this stage were single, and all were in Arctostaphylos rubra mats (at another site up the road, to come, I saw it again, in Arctostaphylos uva-ursi--maybe these spp give it the soil chemistry it needs? didn't see them in Dryas or Salix, though the two sites I saw are hardly definitive)..

I have actually sowed Anemone lithophila this year and they germinated easily. However, if this is the kind of habitat they need I am not sure I ever manage to grow them :-\

I think your anemone looks more like A. parviflora.  I like the Arctous rubra... it must be one I've been overlooking too.

Thanks, Lori, my impression was that parviflora should have less divided leaves? I did read both descriptions, but maybe I missed or mis-read something; this one seems like the leaves will be very divided.. I'll see if I can dig up pics of both online, and re-read the descrips.. and check whether I photographed these by chance later in the season..

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but I'd say your plant is A. parviflora, although, yes, A. parviflora does have the less divided leaves of the two.  What I see in your photo looks like the typical single-stem with the blunt-tipped, coarsely-divided ruff of stem leaves of A . parviflora; the relative size (small) and habit appear to fit.  (A. lithophila, in our area, have prominent bluish petal reverses - something to watch for.)
There are several photos of A. parviflora posted in this section of the forum, and also one or two of A. lithophila.

A. rubra also grows in Newfoundland but it is quite rare here and very restricted in its range...primarily around our Viking site at L'Anse-aux-meadows. A. alpina is our common species.

The flower on the Anemone does look like our A. parviflora.  HOWEVER, our parviflora often have a blue reverse so that feature is not definitive for seperating the two Rocky Mtn species.  Will to wiat for the basal leave to mature to say for sure but I will also side with parviflora.

No, I wasn't meaning to suggest the bluish petal reverses on A. lithophila was a definitive difference (I remember you mentioning blue reverses on A. parviflora in your area, Todd), but just one of the differences - the two species are overall quite different (or at least I think they are  :)).

Thanks for the input, Lori and Todd, I also have photographs of an Anemone from farther up the road I'll post as well; I think I will dig back to another I photographed in the region last year in mid summer, and I think I was thinking of that as parviflora, which seemed very different from these--for one thing, it was in a little patch with flowers rising from basal leaves (full developed) but I may a) be remembering it wrong and b) not have identified it certainly-- but that's why I was thinking these had to be something very different.. I'll dig up those other photos for your comments, may or may not get them done tonight...lol
Oh yeah--more of this Anemone in another spot some metres--in a totally different zone- away, those will be coming up too...

Okay, so here are some more shots of the Anemone from nearby at the Columbia Icefield site-- a bit farther up slope, in an older plant community, still growing in Arctostaphylos rubra.. looking at them now, I see most of the emerging leaves do look quite rounded, and not linear divisions as I thought they were--good thing the camera records better than I remembered ;)

I think I had leaves more like this next one in mind-seems more linear, but will these still widen as they mature to look wider like the others, or is there variation in leaf division in parviflora?

Then, some distance up the road --maybe a half hour to drive? Similar altitude, but a much more mature site, with trees on part of it, and some exposed ridges (the main part of that to come another day)
Would these be the same species, or more than one species?

I was digging to see if I happened to get those Anemones with mature leaves when I was at that site (Columbia Icefield) in late June, last year..
no luck, but I thought I'd show what the Arctostaphylos rubra (files corrected to not say 'salix' anymore..lol) a bit later in the year.. still great colour...

They all look like A. parviflora to me... the last two photos looks like the plant has been distorted by something?

Skulski wrote:

the last two photos looks like the plant has been distorted by something?

Who knows--snow? frost? stepped on by wildlife?..lol Though in person, the flower looked a little abused, the plant just seemed much 'bushier' .. I gather some parviflora can have  more divided leaves such as this.. I think my first view of the species was three toothed lobes without the deeper divisions.. I'm going to dig for those photos, watch them have more divisions too...lol

Here are two shots from 2010, another site again, presumably this is also parviflora, though flowering with leaves fully developed, in a cluster rather than the exclusively single plants I saw at the Columbia Icefield later in the year, but in May this year, the spot these plants were growing in June last year, behind some trees overlooking a waterfall, still had some deep snowbanks!

They look like A. parviflora to me too.
Here are some photos of A. drummondii var. lithophila ("A. lithophila"):
http://www.rmrp.com/Photo%20Pages/AA/Anemone%20drummondii%20var%20lithop...
http://linnet.geog.ubc.ca/ShowDBImage/gallery.aspx?page=0&specrep=0&code...

The plants above--maybe 15-20cm tall? are the largest of those I've shown, the others no more than 10cm, though not fully developed; here is the first I saw, in 2009, much lower elevation (same site mentioned earlier, near the roadside 'lake' with Primula mistassinica and Dodectheon etc).here it was, if anything, even smaller, maybe under 10cm..I see the stem leaves look about the same as the others, I've had in mind all this time the basal leaves, which you can't see much in these pictures, but I have a couple of tiny seedlings (and staying that way..lol), and clearly lost track of the reality of the adult plants!

While we are on Anemones, from that same 2009 trip, what would you call this? I'd said Pulsatilla occidentalis at the time, but that can't be right, this is from a dryish foothill/montane slope, not the moist alpine slopes they are supposed to inhabit, and probably leaves aren't dense enough, either... just a sparse, small Anemone multifida? (single stem)

Skulski wrote:

They look like A. parviflora to me too.
Here are some photos of A. drummondii var. lithophila ("A. lithophila"):
http://www.rmrp.com/Photo%20Pages/AA/Anemone%20drummondii%20var%20lithop...
http://linnet.geog.ubc.ca/ShowDBImage/gallery.aspx?page=0&specrep=0&code...

Thanks, yes I've seen those/similar photos, I looked them up when I was first looking.... the plants I photographed with developed leaves I assumed were parviflora, but some of those with undeveloped leaves seemed more divided to me, and I was thinking of parviflora as lobed and toothed, not divided as well, as I mentioned above.. no doubt variation in such a widespread plant (parviflora)...

Okay, still at the Columbia Icefield, a bit farther away from the glacier (where a few metres could mean many years--the retreat is around 1.5km in the last 125 years), across an internal roadway; the plant communities are similar but with some plants not seen at the first section...

https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

One plant I'd been hoping to see was a small pea I'd seen just finished flowering last year.. I was in luck, and it was in full bloom this year..
Maybe Oxytropis podocarpa? I could claim even less knowledge of these various peas than the Anemones, so please, any comments/corrections are very welcome :)
PS-- I'll see if I can find a pic of a seedpod from last year (later, off to work now!)
At first I only saw one or two plants in low spots between mounds of till (Lori, I was calling these linear mounds moraines--is that correct, or does that term only apply to the major landscape features as opposed to these smaller mounds which could be several metres high and some tens of metres long (maybe more, but not the major things I saw in aerial views while looking at melt rates!)? But then found more of them some metres away.... Great to see this miniature, no more than a couple of inches high in flower..

https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

This little cress (Draba sp?) I doubt I recorded enough detail to make much of an id, unless its a common/recognisable plant) was not common at this site-- I saw this  patch in the barren gravel near a signpost, then another later, a bit upslope laterally, in an older plant community..

same album still: https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

Near the Oxytropis (?) above, I was hoping to find another plant I saw finished flowering last year, which I thought was Sax oppositifolia, a plant I have never seen in person... No such luck, I'd just found the pea when someone started to vociferously protest my presence in that area, and I had to hurry up and shoot the pea and get out!

'Look at me!' she said,  dancing and flapping, 'Follow me!' 'Come away!'

Not wanting to cause her (?) stress, much less accidentally tread on her eggs, I hurried up and left, much as I wanted to spend more time in the more mature plant community in that section.. my only reward was finding more of the Oxytropis on the bank as I left.
I'm familiar with birds/behaviour of this sort from fields and shores near home, but haven't looked up a species for this one; I saw a couple more elsewhere on the site, but not close enough to get them so worked up....

I'm sure not good at Oxytropis/Astragalus but I don't think your plant is Oxytropis podocarpa... the proportion of flower size to leaf size seems off. 
O. podocarpa has very fine, almost feathery leaves (that I hope I'd recognize on sight by now  :rolleyes:) and smaller flowers than that plant.  (I wish I could pull up some photos for comparison but, in the recent computer problems I had that resulted in the emergency purchase of a new one, I didn't lose my pix but they all lost their labels, if you can believe it! So I have some 16000 anonymous pictures... grrrr.)  Is it definitely an Oxytropis rather than an Astragalus?  I'll post some pix of the difference in the keels that is supposed to be the determining factor.  It's very nice, whatever it is!

The little Brassicaceae is pretty showy for its size, especially against that stark background.

The bird is a killdeer (Charadrius vociferus)... Yup, almost impossible to find their nests except by accident... buffy, speckled eggs in a shallow scoop, no nesting material at all... although they certainly let you know you're in the area!

Great photos Cohan, and I love the killdeer, yes, birds of all stripes and sorts certainly do let you know when you've invaded their "personal space", of eggs and babies. ** We have a couple of mother "hens" that must have nested very close to the front of the house and apparently they would rather we didn't step out on the front porch at all! Much racket until we get a few steps away...

Faith

Thanks, Lori and Faith, I thought the bird looked and acted  like a Killdeer, which we have around here, but I'm used to just seeing them with the naked eye, not in zoon shots, so I had not checked markings and had no idea if they nest way up there!

And  certainly am not certain of anything about that pea, Lori; in fact I had originally called it Astragalus for no good reason, but I was going through a very old book I have, Rocky Mountain Wildflowers by A.E. Porsild with paintings by Dagny Tande Lid, and came across the Oxy which looked just like this plant to me (well aware that 'looks like' may not be helpful when there can be numerous similar..lol).. they mention flowers at 2cm which sounds about right.. the plants were tiny, flat and leaves very small and divided.. when it came time to post, I realised I didn't get any really good close shots, probably partly because the bird wanted me to leave, though I'm usually hurrying on these trips, anyway...lol
here's another couple of crops, though they may not add any useful information...sharpened and added contrast

here's one web reference--

http://fieldguide.mt.gov/detail_PDFAB2X0K0.aspx

again, looks about right to me--esp the first view with purple flowers ( I expect some variation on those, hard shades for some digital cameras), though I may be overlooking some important floral characters? Also, leaves may not be fully emerged on my shots.. I'm going to dig for last year's seed pod views, if they exist....
(BTW, losing labels on your photos would be awful! I'm trying to do a double back-up- external hard drive and DVD, though I'm way behind on the second; and picasa, so 3, I guess, though that's not all photos, and smaller versions)

Here it is from last year, in fruit, not a close shot, unfortunately, and a couple more of mature foliage--

and couldn't resist this view with Hedysarum boreale

full album (one of many from that day!) from June 26, 2010:
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsJune26201...

Schier wrote:

Great photos Cohan, and I love the killdeer, yes, birds of all stripes and sorts certainly do let you know when you've invaded their "personal space", of eggs and babies. ** We have a couple of mother "hens" that must have nested very close to the front of the house and apparently they would rather we didn't step out on the front porch at all! Much racket until we get a few steps away...

Faith

Are they killdeers in your front yard? We have wrens which also make a fuss if you get too close, and they are right between the two houses...lol
There's a spot in the bush on the farm where I sometimes walk where crows were presumably nesting, and they would set up a racket if I was within--not sure, 50 metres or more?..lol

last for this album: https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

Another pea of uncertain name-- foliage looked like the high altitude Hedysarum boreale common at this site--rather fleshy leaves, but only some plants had these tumble-weed like structures of last year's stems.. Looking at last year's pics, I was reminded that there was another pea--possibly an Astragalus, with pale flowers and similar semi-prostrate stems and similar leaves.  Looking at the old pics, I cannot tell for sure which plant would have had these dried stems, but it seems like the Hedysarum show more dried stems in the photos.. not sure why only some plants have this, if its not a different species.. also a view of the typical miniature forest- a couple of Dryas spp, a couple of Arctostaphylos, various peas, etc...

Several views and some rock garden arrangement tips....

I take it back... it's definitely Oxytropis podocarpa. 

Thanks for the confirmation :) I know its hard to tell from photos taken at a particular time and place and angle etc!

Your wonderful vista and plant shots are making me very restless Cohan.  :D

I feel an urge to get out in the 'field' again down here although it will have to be coastal as snow is forecast to lower to 600mtrs in the next day or so and it depends on how soon my foot mends after badly rolling the right ankle 10 days ago  :'(---a sign of the aging process is that it's taking longer than i hoped for ...... >:(

Thanks for posting.

Cheers Dave

Thanks Dave--that's one of the great benefits of the forums--we can see great stuff when we can't get out there.. I'm always thrilled with the amazing NZ flora!

Earlier I mentioned going a little upslope, laterally. Most of the area I've been exploring has been low ground below the glacier, and area of mounds and ridges of glacial till, with varying plant communities from isolated pioneers on gravel, to locally dense mats of subshrubs in older spots sheltered between mounds, but everywhere, lots of rock and gravel exposed..
Just slightly upslope seems to have been longer out of the ice as there is a full surface coverage of plants, including lichens not seen below, and lots of grasses, as well as most of the species seen below..The effect was a beautiful patchwork, even without significant flowering...
I only spent a few minutes on this surface--there was not a lot in flower yet anyway, and I didn't feel comfortable crunching around on the  seemingly fragile lichen surface just to satisfy my curiosity..

https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

The same Anemone parviflora we talked about above, showing other common plants in the second shot - Antennaria sp (a sp with shorter, wider leaves than seen on many other sites) and Hedysarum boreale

The same  Draba sp seen below? Not common here.. And a view out of the valley...

cohan wrote:

Earlier I mentioned going a little upslope, laterally. Most of the area I've been exploring has been low ground below the glacier, and area of mounds and ridges of glacial till, with varying plant communities from isolated pioneers on gravel, to locally dense mats of subshrubs in older spots sheltered between mounds, but everywhere, lots of rock and gravel exposed..
Just slightly upslope seems to have been longer out of the ice as there is a full surface coverage of plants, including lichens not seen below, and lots of grasses, as well as most of the species seen below..The effect was a beautiful patchwork, even without significant flowering...
I only spent a few minutes on this surface--there was not a lot in flower yet anyway, and I didn't feel comfortable crunching around on the  seemingly fragile lichen surface just to satisfy my curiosity..

You have to take your shoes off, Cohan! I often walk without shoes in such places. Here at my summerhouse I do not wear shoes at all except when visiting the town.
You show very nice scenery Cohan, and also exciting plants and birds(!). If you should have the opportunity to collect seed of Hedysarum boreale I would love to give it a try at our mountain cabin.
Speaking of birds, a European Goldfinch Carduelis carduelis has visited us every day and picked Tragopogon seeds. It is often visiting at home in winter when we feed the birds but I haven't seen it in the summer here before.
(Picture from here http://cyberbirding.uib.no/photo/c_carduelis_02.php )

Beautiful bird, Trond! Here in the summer, the shrubs and trees are full of birds, they make a lot of sound, but hard to see them, except for some bold ones like robins and wrens, and yesterday the magpies were suddenly very loud and visible on the acreage..

You know, I'm just not much of a shoes off guy,( out of the question at home--the 'grass' is full of sticks that fall from trees, spruce cones and lots of other hard/prickly things--not to mention bees and many kinds and sizes of ants on the ground, besides you try not to have much bare skin at all because of mosquitoes, definitely not skin you cant keep an eye on ;))and my feet would not be tough enough for that place--it may be delicate, but that does not mean soft..lol

I'll watch for Hedysarum b. for sure, but so far have never been in the right place at the right time for seed- neither for the regular form that grows into the foothills and beyond, nor for the high altitude form which is lower and fleshier.. Foolishly, I think I was possibly at Abraham Lake at a time I could have found seed last year, but I was collecting composite seed, and photographing Eriogonum, and didn't think to look for the Hedysarum seed! Of course I thought of it later...lol

I used to go bare foot everywhere in the woods in my teens.  Then one day when I was out exploring I cut my toe rather deeply on a piece of glass. I didn't even know it until I waded through a creek and saw pink water...

Now I am a tenderfoot, too.

https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

Mostly I'd been staying farther from the glacier, since that's where most of the plants are! We did drive up a bit closer for a quick look, since there is a floodplain that has a lot of Chamerion (Epilobium) latifolium in summer, and Saxifraga aizoides.. as it turned out, both species were just emerging..

The views were still impressive... and some little inukshuks someone built down by the water (which looked more like ice/slush-- I didn't go very close)

RickR wrote:

I used to go bare foot everywhere in the woods in my teens.  Then one day when I was out exploring I cut my toe rather deeply on a piece of glass. I didn't even know it until I waded through a creek and saw pink water...

Now I am a tenderfoot, too.

True, that would be another risk here too--glass, nails, wire, metal, plastic....lol  One would hope up by the glacier might be garbage free, but not sure I'd trust tourists that far ;)

https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

Dryas (probably drummondii) colonises well into the floodplain area, not sure if it still floods regularly or not.. these seedheads from last year.. note the scraping on the rock from the glacier in third pic...

A bit farther back were some willows, Salix sp -maybe around a metre tall, and I was interested to see Pyrola sp for the first time up here, under the Salix at the lip of  the flood plain ......

https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

Final shots at this site; We drove across the highway, to the end of the vast parking area (not too busy on this cool spring day, except near the major tourist buildings far away at the other end of the parking area) to use the outhouse before leaving.. Watching from some concrete parking barriers was this little person.. I believe its a Golden Mantled Ground Squirrel, Spermophilus lateralis.. I didn't have any snacks for it...

Some last views...

Thank you for the guiding through a very interesting landscape, Cohan!

Glad you enjoyed! I still have the whole trip home with a few more stops  :-[

Heading back,  but still at altitude, the highway near the snow/tree line.. a few views from the vehicle..
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/AlbertaRockyMountainsMay312011...

A pause in posting the mountain pics.. from a short walk up the road, some Castillejas... the Flora shows only C miniata in my area, but lutescens and occidentalis are not terribly far away, and I do wonder how carefully surveyed this 'agricultural' area has been! I saw mention of a possible hybrid for similar plants to those I have seen in my area on flickr.....
I posted elsewhere and earlier, photos of Castilleja a couple miles from here, a varied colour colony, with many beautiful mixed colours; even closer to home, starting about a 1/4 mile up the road, and continuing in varying densities on both sides for at least a half mile.. this colony is not as mixed--most plants are in the salmon to orange/scarlet range, but there are some of the near whites and other pale colours, and an occasional true red (less orange)..
full album: https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/July102011Castilleja
and the companion album of other plants, not yet captioned:
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/July102011BesideThePaintbrushes

just a sampling here

Nice range of colours!  Can't help you out, off-hand, with IDs though... I've lacked the concentration to apply the key myself.  It seems to be largely the shape of the bracts, at any rate...

Lori wrote:

Nice range of colours!  Can't help you out, off-hand, with IDs though... I've lacked the concentration to apply the key myself.  It seems to be largely the shape of the bracts, at any rate...

Thanks, Lori--yeah, I haven't sat down with the glossary myself yet, either...lol.. I had basically thought it was really variable miniata, but I just have not seen anything online (which I no means not that much!) showing this level of variation.. I happened on a flickr posting  taken a little south of here, with a mixed colour plant similar to those at the other site nearby,(see this album:
https://picasaweb.google.com/cactuscactus/Castilleja2009

and someone more knowledgeable was suggesting it looked like a hybrid..he was hoping to get into Canada to see some of them, so I'm watching that thread for further replies...
If I get a chance and think of an easy way to tag that I can find and doesn't draw too much attention from the road, lol, I may go mark some of the colour forms just up the road to see if they come at all true from seed (something I really doubt)

Colour variation of flowering plants are rather common! Especially albino/luteo forms pop up now and then. Here the common cranesbill (Geranium sylvaticum) often have white or pink flowers rather than the common red-violet(?) forms.

C miniata does have some normal colour variations, but not usually this much.. still, with no clear alternatives, I was just assuming that these populations had more variation than what I could find in any of the  books I have, or online; recently, though, I have been in touch with someone in U.S. who is more familiar with the genus, and he believes these may be hybrids with one or more species besides miniata; I'm waiting till he is back home from fieldwork to take a closer look at my photos from two sites near here :)
Interestingly, there is not much colour variation in most of the local wildflowers (that come to mind now!) and mostly quite subtle.. Geranium richardsonii is my local geranium, and ranges from pure white to white with pink veins to almost pinkish white...lol

Okay, I thought at least I should finish that May 31 trip to the mountains started so long ago!
https://picasaweb.google.com/111492944361897930115/AlbertaRockyMountains...
On the way home, not so very far from the Columbia Icefield, and still at fairly high altitude- below the timerline, but not by a whole lot---
Hilda Ridge. This is a roadside pullout area, between the Columbia Icefield and where the road drops back down again, going south. Based on the notices posted at the entry to the site, there is some sort of access to skiing from here, not sure where/how.. never been up there in winter, and not likely to do so, driving through a long stretch of avalanche prone roads to get there!... I go there for the plants...

Not a large area, it has fairly steep to steep gravel/stone slopes, treed to varying degrees, which fall down to a river on three sides, and the highway  and then higher slopes rising on the fourth side. There are some exposed areas with nice plants along ridge edges and down the slopes, as well as among open trees and bushes on the flat top of the site, and also down into shadier places among denser tree growth and shaded slopes. Shaded areas still had significant snow on May 31, and it was not long gone in the open it seemed...

Still at Hilda Ridge.  https://picasaweb.google.com/111492944361897930115/AlbertaRockyMountains...
Earlier, we were talking about Anemones I'd seen in a few places, including on this trip, a half hour or so (? rough remembering) up the road at the Columbia Icefield. There, what was presumably Anemone parviflora was found, commonly growing through Arctostaphylos rubra. Here, it was growing in mats of Arctostaphylos uva-ursi... Still generally no more than 10cm high...

Anemone parviflora with Arctostaphylos uva-ursi

Arctostaphylos uva-ursi

https://picasaweb.google.com/111492944361897930115/AlbertaRockyMountains...

Some little Crucifers; I just don't have enough knowledge of these to attempt names- and I don't think I've ever seen these plants in seed, so no help there.. I presume the yellow flowers (though there are bright and creamy yellow flowers) and the white (leaves also look different) are different species, but wouldn't swear to it!

Unidentified Brassicaceae

Unidentified Brassicaceae, with Arctostaphylos uva-ursi and Zigadenus elegans in first image

Unidentified Brassicaceae, white flowers, with tiny Sedge (Carex sp?)

Last two for this site:
https://picasaweb.google.com/111492944361897930115/AlbertaRockyMountains...

Salix species;  a mid-sized willow as far as I remember- i.e. a metre or so tall, at least; I think I photographed ground hugging species at this site later in the year (not this year) but no sign of them this early..

An Antennaria species in an exposed spot in gravel at ridge's edge; definitely not attempting these, and especially without flowers.. these higher altitude plants seem to have slightly proportionately wider, shorter leaves, and a less tight mat than those in dry places farther down..

Very nice, Cohan!
Had I found those brassicas here I had taken them for some Draba species but over there .. no idea ;)

Yes, they surely look like Draba species to me too (the yellow and pale yellow ones).  Not sure just how many Draba species are in your area, but it would be fun (at least for me, it would be fun) to hit the floras and keys to attempt an ID on those little beauties.  They would make good subjects for a trough garden.

Thanks Trond and Mark-- yeah, I figured Draba too, likely; there are a lot of them in the mts here! And so far I only have the very tiny maps in Flora of Alberta-- the whole province in a couple of cm- so I can't tell exactly where those tiny dots are, other than in the mountains, near a large river, etc
As for keys, I've glanced at them, but without seedpods (none present so early  in the year) it seems very unlikely I can tell much for sure... Likely that site has been officially botanised, but I have not seen any such information yet... I agree, they are very charming plants I'd be happy to grow :)

Continuing on the May 31, 2011 trip into the mountains...
Continuing on from the last site, still on the Icefields Parkway which goes between Banff and Jasper townsites; The road has been up not too far from the treeline, and continues at that altitude for a while longer as we head back south, then drops down much lower, following a river valley  much of the way back to our turn west at the Saskatchewan River Crossing..
At the high levels at the end of May, there was still snow in many places, and only the earliest plants were growing or flowering.. farther down, things were beginning to green...
These are just shots taken from the vehicle while we were driving (no, I wasn't the one driving while taking photos ;)

Another break in sequence, I wanted to post some images of Gentiana, and decided the full posting should go here...

Here is a plant that I don't think is too common around here ( mind you, I have realised I have pretty stiff standards for common, as we do have numerous species that will be found at nearly any site you look at, and certainly in nearly every spot with a suitable habitat)- I have only run into it twice so far, in quite different spots maybe 10-12 miles apart as the crow flies..
The funny thing is, the first time I saw it, on of my earliest bicycle botanising trips, in 2009,  it was on a spot of medium moisture, in a strip of land between a field and the roadside ditch, not far (100 metres at a wild guess, maybe less) from a farmstead, and since this site also had the only presumably escaped colony I've seen of Campanula rapunculoides, I actually thought this was another garden escape- especially since the only wildflower book I had at the time did not mention any true Gentians in my area!
It wasn't until I found it again, in 2010, that I realised it must be a native, and once I looked in some other books, realised it could be Gentiana affinis- I still haven't carefully compared it to the formal description, but it should be the only true Gentian in my area...
This first plant (and I only saw one plant maybe 2) was fairly robust, probably around 30 cm, with numerous flowering stems. My old camera has issues with blue/violet, and I don't think the colour is quite right in these photos, I think it should be a bit deeper and bluer (I've edited, but still take it with a grain of salt); though I don't remember the other population as being so blue--they exactly matched the Gentianopsis they were growing with- more violet; maybe it was just about the kind of light on those occasions! I'll have to try to find some this year with the new camera!

I did get back to this site, September 24 of the same year, and got some seed (unsown- thinking it was a garden escape at that time, I didn't give it much priority! wonder if it's still viable?), here's what it looked like then:

Now the other site, from 2010- a bit later, Aug 25 (Aug 18 above), yet the plants seem not as far along- first off, much smaller plants- single stems and not as tall, a wetter location in a roadside ditch, and I think a cooler August, I believe Aug '09 was quite warm, whereas we'd already had frosts at this time in '10- I was thinking it very late for plants to be just getting going on their flowering-- surely a risky strategy in this climate- I wonder if they got to make seed even that year? They seemed a bit later even than the Gentianopsis crinita they were growing with, which were also in flower, but did have a number of spent blossoms and some seed capsules coming along even if not fully ripe...
These plants had some red on the leaves as well as stems (possibly from the cold nights) and overall charmed me more than the larger, more floriferous specimen had the year before!

Cohan, your images of variable Gentiana affinis have made an impression, I must put this on my list of autumn plants to grow.  I agree the smaller form in your last post are charming.  Looking this up, I see on the USDA profiles page, the species has oodles of synonyms which implies lots of plant variability.
http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=GEAF

Thanks for showing the two forms, I have much to learn about native North American gentians. :)

Thanks, Mark! I have plenty to learn myself, didn't even know it was native...lol.. If I manage to get some fresh seed, I will keep you in mind-the problem with the site with smaller plants is that its a hefty bike ride, and those seem to ripen seed so late that riding conditions may not be so good...lol .. but who knows, I may find a closer spot? I'd like to try growing both- its quite possible the large plant is just older and/or in a better site etc

Another plant portrait- actually from just up the road from the small Gentiana above- this road has a slightly different flora than most of the sites around here I have botanised- I will do a feature on it when I get the albums done...
Meanwhile, here is a plant I have yet to identify, even though I have sent seed to a number of folks overseas! It feels like an Erigeron to me, though I have not yet been able to say which one-- it is smaller than most of the other local species, and though it has small stem leaves, it has clear basal rosette clumps through flowering, unlike most of the other locals.. The flowers are a bit pinker than appears in the photos, and all the same colour, no whites as some washed out shots appear.. it grows on banks at the sides of the roadside ditches- theoretically these spots could be quite dry at times (though again, the ditch bottoms, not far away are always damper, and nothing was dry around here the last couple of summers!).. you can see it in one or two shots growing with Oxytropis monticola, and Dasiphora (Potentilla) fruticosa among others..
I forgot to add, its about 30cm tall (flowering stems)..
EDIT: See below, I'm going to go out on a limb and call this Erigeron glabellus

That one looks familiar ;)  I gave my opinion on this plant's ID in the "Roadside Plant" topic:
http://nargs.org/smf/index.php?topic=972.msg14527#msg14527

Thanks, Mark- I agree the flowers look a lot like Erigeron philadelphicus, which I believe occurs here (I have not keyed out the several spp that look like that, which are quite common here), but I think if i am interpreting the Flora correctly, philadelphicus should be a taller plant (though height is variable in all of these) without the significant persistent basal leaves shown by these plants- which actually showed an even fuller clump of basal rosettes at the end of the season when I was collecting seed..

So, going back to the Flora of Alberta again, narrowing down from the 24 species of Erigeron in Alberta- several are alpine species, so they are out; several annual/biennial- out, since these plants have those well-developed basal rosettes after flowering, clearly not monocarpic; those not having pink/purple flowers, out; the remaining relevant characters seem to be persistent basal leaves, eliminating a couple more which do not; whether cauline leaves are reduced- this seems to  eliminate E peregrinus, which was at first glance a good bet; and finally number of ray flowers- while I definitely did not count them! these plants have a lot of them, which again seemed to rule out peregrinus, which has fewer (giving a more aster-like look to the flowers).. I am left with Erigeron glabellus -while I wont swear that's right, it seems a pretty good fit, and is widespread on the map (if anything, too much so, making me wonder why I have only found it in this one limited area-- a number of plants over about a mile or so on one road) and listed habitat type in the Flora is also about right...

Cohan, I do not recognize your species but it seems to occupy the same habitat that Gentiana pneumonanthe does here. It is not common and I have only seen it 2-3 times. It is always a pleasure to find it!

Thanks, Trond! This gentian is lovely- I do love all the other members of the family which are more common here too, and I'll show them soon-- the subtle but lovely Halenia deflexa and Gentianella amarella are everywhere, and the very showy Gentianopsis crinita I have found in a number of places..

cohan wrote:

I am left with Erigeron glabellus -while I wont swear that's right, it seems a pretty good fit, and is widespread on the map (if anything, too much so, making me wonder why I have only found it in this one limited area-- a number of plants over about a mile or so on one road) and listed habitat type in the Flora is also about right...

Cohan, I think you nailed the ID, good sleuthing!  Just took a loot at images of E. glabellus and it is indeed a good fit. I'm not familiar with this attractive species.  Checking the USDA Plant Profile pages, it seems that in your area it would be var. pubescens.
http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=ERGL2

Thanks, Mark-- this is my favourite local Erigeron (foliage and size wise- all the flowers are nice) in my near area- until you get into the foothills/mts and the nice small species start.. I collected seed (2010)and didnt get any sown, will be trying to see if its still viable this spring..
Flora of Alberta mentions that 'our area' if you can call Alberta an area! - "ssp. glabellus, with short, appressed pubescence, the leaves essentially glabrous, and ssp. pubescens with coarse, spreading, septate hairs throughout" frankly I'm not sure what kind of hairiness that describes! more glossary time needed...lol.. No suggestion of whether those two ssp. are in different places, or just random variations ... The plants I photographed seem mostly smooth apart from hairs around the edge of the leaves, so not sure where that places them...

I found one more album of shots from Alhambra Road (where the small Gentianas and Erigeron above were shot)- the last album was the third week in August, and I was commenting on the Gentianas still being in flower (they were) and not seed yet - really I was thinking of this visit- late Sept is very late in our season! and the Gentianas were still not in seed-- Although the Erigeron seed was finally ripe- quite late compared to other species in the genus around here......I wasn't able to get back after this, so don't know if the Gentiana ever ripened ....

Erigeron glabellus

Same day, Sept 22, 2010, same place- Alhambra Road (not the official name, its the road through the town of Alhambra), about 12-14 miles or so from home..
At this time, there had definitely been frosts- in fact there was snow the day before this botanising bike ride! The Gentiana affinis still had not ripened seed, though some seemed close, other plants were still in flower, as were its cousins Gentianopsis crinita, growing beside (not pictured here)...
Notice the wide variation in leaf shapes and fall colour.. these plants are quite pretty in their fall shades, even the faded flowers very picturesque.. again, these are small plants, prob 10-20cm....

I wont repost the whole thing here, just a couple of similar shots, but thought this post on Antennaria-probably A pulcherrima, one of the tall/erect species, deserved a mention - see it here:
http://nargs.org/smf/index.php?topic=690.15    reply 29
This is something like 5 miles from home, in a nice stretch of roadside/field edge, at least seasonally moist, where I have photographed and collected seed from  a nice assortment of plants- nothing really rare, though this Antennaria is not too common around here (according to the map, may not have been officially observed this far from the foothills- depending on whether I have the id right!)
Antennaria pulcherrima

Thanks for linking back, Cohan.  There is already so much good information and photos archived here that I don't want to forget any of them!  

By the way, you can link directly to any single post or reply:
--- Click on title of the post in question (for replies, it begins with "Re:") to open a page that begins with that message.
--- copy the URL address, and paste it for the link
--- The link will then open the entire page containing the particular post, but will automatically scroll down to where the intended post begins.  
--- Depending on how long it takes for the page to load, you may need to wait a bit, because it won't auto find the post until it finishes loading.

So here is reply #29:
http://nargs.org/smf/index.php?topic=690.msg14758#msg14758

Thanks, Rick- good tip- now that you mention direct linking to specific replies, I'm pretty sure I should have known that! I'll try to remember this time, as its handier...lol

Okay- I am determined to at least finish posting photos from that May 2011 trip in this thread..lol
full album of this section:
https://picasaweb.google.com/111492944361897930115/AlbertaRockyMountains...
So, back at it! To save time, I'm using much of the same text as on SRGC, but a slightly different and larger set of photos..
From the near tree line elevations in Jasper National Park, we've come back south toward home, eventually crossed back into Banff National Park, then left the north/south running Icefields Parkway for the more or less east/west David Thompson Highway which will take us all the way home!  The 'off colour' forest in a couple of the  photos is an area which was deliberately burned by park officials a couple of years ago..

As you can see, not a lot of traffic on this highway! Probably there are some key weekends when its much busier (we are very unlikely to go into the mountains on those weekends!) but even times when the Icefields Parkway between Banff and Jasper townsites is quite busy, this highway is not...

The bear was very close to the road, near the eastern boundary of Banff National Park, and seemingly dining on dandelions-- maybe that's what we need around here ;)

full album of this section:
https://picasaweb.google.com/111492944361897930115/AlbertaRockyMountains...

.. Then we move into and  through the montane zone and Kootenay Plains- an area I've posted images from in the past-- a rather broad area between mountains, with a couple of rivers and rather dry grassy plains; Due to  low precipitation (variably, depending on exposure etc) and the open grassy areas (and the rivers, no doubt!) this has been an important area for wildlife, esp in winter when they can come down from  harsher/snowier higher elevations and find grass for grazing with generally shallow snow cover if any. The concentration of wildlife (and easily traversed plains) made the area important to Native peoples as well, and there are still large chunks of land in the region managed by aboriginal people. There was an early attempt at farming/ranching by European settlers in the area which failed (I don't know the history of it, but suspect low precipitation/fragile plant communities in some sections- the grassy areas that presumably would-be ranchers were drawn to- probably made agriculture a dicey proposition!).. now most of the land in the plains is protected...

more to come from this day, including a stop at my favourite site in the plains... but not tonight!

Nice to see the black bear, Cohan!  We only tend to see black bears down at road elevations too; we see grizzlies (though not often) up where we hike.  Interesting that it has an ear tag... it's been marked for some sort of study purpose.  

Often on these dashes through the mountains we have not seen much more than deer (which we usually see many of between Rocky Mtn House and Nordegg especially (for those who don't know the area as Lori does, that's through the 'pre'foothills to the beginnings of the mountains); this trip we saw sheep by Abraham Lake, moose ( I forget where, but of course we see them not rarely at home) and this bear..
I guess if it's going to hang around within a short distance of the park boundary and kiosk, it's looking to be tagged and studied..lol

Cohan - seeing the black bear reminded me that the only one I have seen was also in the Kootenay area . I had a great time driving from Astoria OR to Canal Flats , following the river where I could . Really enjoyed the scenery , the plants and that I could buy a Moro bar in Canada . Seeing all the dead trees in the Roger's Pass area was a bit heartbreaking . Got as far east as Banff .
Keep the pictures coming bud

Sorry to temporarily divert your thread, Cohan, but I had to look up "Moro bar".
http://www.cadbury.co.nz/Products/Chocolate-Bars/Moro-Bar.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moro_(chocolate_bar)

(They are not so common here that I even knew what it was!  ;)  The basic one without nuts sounds Mars bar-ish though.)

Swweeeett!!! You have Mars bars too . I'm coming back

Yes, no shortage of those here.  In addition to the regular chocolate bars, stores selling fresh hand-made chocolates have sprung up on every street corner in recent years in the bigger centers.  Do let us know when to expect you so that we can lay in a supply!  :D

cohan wrote:

The bear was very close to the road, near the eastern boundary of Banff National Park, and seemingly dining on dandelions-- maybe that's what we need around here ;)

The bear or the dandelions?

I have seen a lot of wild animals but no bear yet :o

Lori wrote:

  Do let us know when to expect you so that we can lay in a supply!  :D

Will be in the Wenatchees in June . The lure of chocolate would probably be enough to get me across the border

I'd never heard of Moro bars, either, but Mars is a staple ;)
No hand-made chocolates in my neck of the woods (I suppose someone might be doing it in Red Deer, but I haven't noticed....), but I used to visit a place that had them in Toronto- along some nice things like little Italian corn meal cookies.. one advantage of that sort of place is prices that keep you from over indulging  ;D

There are actually two areas with the name Kootenay -I've looked up the reason in the past and forgot already  :-[ but I assume its something to do with the home range of the Native tribe of the same name.. the (I think) larger and better known area is the mountain park etc, in British Columbia, west of Banff National Park.. seems a beautiful area- I've been through as a child, we had relatives on Vancouver Island and went through the mountains many times with my grandparents, but I have not been there in recent years;
The area I was in is the Kootenay Plains, in Alberta, in the eastern edge of the Rockies, not that far from home, probably a much drier place, though I don't know all the ins and outs of the other Kootenays!

Trond- we have plenty of dandelions already! I was thinking maybe we need bears to eat them- though we'd need an awful lot! Bears are rarely seen in my immediate area (I've never seen one here, though its not totally unheard of) but by the time you go about 30-40km west its quite possible- by that distance you are in the foothills forest (though not the foothills) which extends all the way into the mountains...

I'll try to post the next set of photos tonight if my internet connection is better (wonder how many tries it will take to post this...lol)

So...

Where does the Kootenay Agricultural Society come in?

Perennial Seed Germination Information:

I had no idea (nice seed info, btw!)-- so I looked it up-- I knew it couldn't be Alberta- no agriculture on the Kootenay Plains! (some Native communities probably have some livestock, but I've never seen any of it!) and surely no one growing the range of plants in that seed guide!
It seems to be from Castlegar, British Columbia, a place I know we have passed through on family trips, but I don't know much about it- my impression is that its between the higher wetter western Rockies- and the lower drier Okanagan.. and quite far south, not so far from the U.S. border.. not that close to Kootenay National Park, either, but on the Kootenay River..
http://www.hellobc.com/castlegar.aspx?gclid=CNaagbmBqa4CFQ8CQAod5By6RA
map:
http://maps.google.ca/maps?hl=en&cp=7&gs_id=s&xhr=t&rlz=1C2CHMA_enCA366&...

Bet you could grow some nice alpines in those mountains- probably a few zones warmer than me...

here's a link to the Kootenay region in B.C.
http://www.hellobc.com/kootenay-rockies.aspx

And here is the Kootenay Plains, where I visited..
http://www.whereadventurebegins.com/kootenayplains.htm

Thanks, Cohan.  I googled it a tiny bit, too, but got rather confused with so many places with the same name in it.  That germination data is one of the sources that Tom Clothier used in his data compilation (not his Deno indexing, of course). 

It does seem 'The Kootenays' in B.C. covers quite a large area (I hadn't realised!) with a very long lake, a river, a park, etc- so there would be all sorts of uses of the name, and the area in Alberta is totally separate...
The search led me to look at various places in south eastern B.C.- many of which we used to pass through on family trips- but most of which I knew very little about..lol
Then, I was led to look at hardiness zones, which led me to this site, with some rather shocking updates to climate zones-- I find myself in zone 4A- when we'd thought of ourselves as 2/3! I shall need to be bolder ;)
http://www.plantmaps.com/

cohan wrote:

Then, I was led to look at hardiness zones, which led me to this site, with some rather shocking updates to climate zones-- I find myself in zone 4A- when we'd thought of ourselves as 2/3! I shall need to be bolder ;)
http://www.plantmaps.com/

Well, it's good that it's encouraging but it's always better to let the plants tell you what's hardy and what isn't, than someone's untested, assumed, or vague assignment of zone ratings!  (A lot more fun too!  :)  )
(Arrghh, my apologies, but you know how I can't resist commenting on the unreliability of zone ratings...  :rolleyes:)

Edit:   And now having looked at the map.... wow, it's bizarre!  The area west of Calgary is in a warmer zone than Calgary??  I doubt that people trying to garden out on acreages west of here would agree with that!  :o  Oops, my mistake... the colours on the legend are hard to match up to the colours on the map, but on closer examination, I think it shows a warmer zone in Calgary than west of here, which makes sense directionally.

cohan wrote:

Trond- we have plenty of dandelions already! I was thinking maybe we need bears to eat them- though we'd need an awful lot! Bears are rarely seen in my immediate area (I've never seen one here, though its not totally unheard of) but by the time you go about 30-40km west its quite possible- by that distance you are in the foothills forest (though not the foothills) which extends all the way into the mountains...

I'll try to post the next set of photos tonight if my internet connection is better (wonder how many tries it will take to post this...lol)

Cohan, I assumed you wanted more bears and less dandelions ;)

When I am at my cabin with a bad connection I use to upload one pic at the time and using the modify button to add more.

Probably less pics at one time is a good idea, but sometimes my connection is not simply slow, its very unstable- in the time I prepare a post it might disconnect/reconnect several times, and trying to post, esp photos is an exercise in frustration.. other times its fast and good, especially late at night, when not so many people in the area are using their smartphones!
Anyway, the tangential searching mentioned earlier has me wandering through real estate listings in southeast B.C... no I'm not moving, but its fun to look! So no pics tonight...lol

Lori, I am with you on those zone ratings, I was really joking above- I'll try plants that I think might have some chance based on what I can find out about where they come from, compared to conditions here.. what number is on my map wont change much
-- especially, I find, around here--- there is just not a lot of experience growing a lot of the things I am interested in, so the ratings for plants are just not that useful- especially those that are not based on anything ;) If the zone ratings (for plants) are based on temperatures in their habitat, it at least gives you some idea to start from, though its only one factor...

These 'new' zones for Alberta are kind of dubious... we certainly still expect some zone 2 lows, even if not more than a couple of days, and maybe not every winter-- so zone 4 really seems like a stretch.. they also put Rocky Mountain House, Sylvan Lake and Calgary all in the same zone- those two towns are not quite the same as each other (there are reasons one is at the edge of foothills biome and the other is at the edge of aspen parkland!) much less either being the same as Calgary- where your winter minimums may be close to ours, but you are on average a few degrees warmer in winter! And I think Red Deer was 3b- colder than Rocky Mountain House 60km west? seems unlikely (even with a bit of additional 'chinook' advantage in Rocky, there are also more likely to be out of season frosts)

RickR wrote:

So...

Where does the Kootenay Agricultural Society come in?

Perennial Seed Germination Information:

    [attachthumb=1]

That's a pretty amazing germination guide.  I've printed it off.   I wonder whose experiences it's based on?  It's too bad they didn't give themselves credit for it!  :)

The season is beginning, albeit slowly and subtly- the native plants here are well aware that spring does not mean an end to freezing, so they begin cautiously- and of course snow remains in many places, and the soil is still frozen in many others, or just thawed recently...

To my surprise, I saw Petasites (likely sagittatus, but we have frigidus v palmatus and many hybrid populations- all of which are so close together that I wonder whether any of our plants are completely one species or another) budding-- only in one area, though I didn't visit any of the other earliest spots- places at the southern edge of woods that will melt relatively earlier and warm up faster; this site has maybe a further advantage: the plants are on the south side of a small raised area, several metres square, probably the remains of a brush pile that has been rotted into the soil over many decades;

many other wetland areas still have knee-deep snow!

I always loved these flowers as one of our very earliest (probably the earliest in my area, edging out Caltha and Viola, though peak bloom of all of them overlap strongly), but photographing them in the last few years, I've come to love the buds as much as anything-- odd little fuzzy wrapped grape clusters!

These plants are only a few inches tall, barely emerging above the water yet, and this water still has snow melting into it only a couple of metres away!

cohan wrote:

I always loved these flowers as one of our very earliest (probably the earliest in my area, edging out Caltha and Viola, though peak bloom of all of them overlap strongly), but photographing them in the last few years, I've come to love the buds as much as anything-- odd little fuzzy wrapped grape clusters!

Promising buds are always nice to find - especially the harbingers of spring and warmer weather :)

Yes, nice to see some buds :) NO warmth for now, though, after some warmish days, we are supposed to head into cool and wet weather..(I'll post on weather thread...)