The pictures don’t always disagree. The Audubon Reference has a color photo (plate 660) with blue and pink flowers. And that’s exactly what we have in this photo.
These are Mountain Bluebells or Mertensia ciliata. While colorful, they weren’t very large and would be easy to miss. These were hiding behind a tree. Wouldn’t have seen them standing in the parking lot.
Taken at the Undine Falls overlook area.
Here’s one that is a little more firmly identified. It is a Sticky Geranium. We were on our way to Mammoth Hot Springs and stopped to take in Undine Falls.
There is a lot to be said for roadside pull-outs and rest stops. In addition to the scenic views, there are ofter small clusters of flowers near the borders of the parking area. It doesn’t always require a half mile rugged hike.
In addition to wildlife viewing (I’ve got a number of baby buffalo photos), the Lamar Valley excursion also provided some wildflowers.
I’m guessing that these are some kind of Stickseed, though I could be wrong. At first I thought they might be Forget-me-nots. However, these flowers are more on a long stem than ground cover.
There were some white flowers that looked very similar. And they were in the same cluster of plants.
I did crop out a forward facing shot, however, from one of larger photos.
So this might be Stickseed or it might be Mystery Flower(s) #4. I’d appreciate confirmation and correction by someone.
As long as we’re on a roll with Blue-Purple flowers, let’s go for Mystery Flower #3.
This was the third interesting flower I found during my short walk from the parking lot in Lamar Valley. My original intent was to see if I could get a shot of the buffalo on the other side of a short rise. I did, but found these on the walk back.
My guess is it is a Phacelia of some kind. A close match in the Audubon book is Purple Fringe. Perhaps the most notable feature is the protruding stamens, giving it a pin cushion appearance.
I’m open to a more specific species. Suggest away!
Another purple plant was easier to identify. It has a very distinctive shape. It also has a number of names. The Audubon Reference list three names. Vase Flower; Sugar Bowls; and Leather Flower.
This photo was take in Lamar Valley, at the same stop as the Prairie Smoke photo. I was using my zoom (long) lens. But I also didn’t have a boardwalk to navigate and could get the angle I wanted on the flower.
Now for Mystery Flower #2.
This photo was taken from the boardwalk with my short lens. But, digital photography yields some interesting features when blown up to full size on a computer. You have the purple flowers in the sunlight. You also have some flowers that aren’t quite open yet.
To the upper right of the flowers in the sunlight, hidden in the grass, are a number of the same flower that haven’t opened yet.
I’m leaning toward ”Fringed Gentian.” It seems close to the photo in the Audubon book as well as the plastic fold-out card for Yellowstone Wildflowers.
But, that’s why we have comments. Anyone have another likely suspect?
There was one flower that was easy to identify. We have paintbrushes in Texas. This immature plant hasn’t started to show its true colors, but the basic shape of the petals gives it away.
The Indian Paintbrush is the State Flower for Wyoming.
As a note for Amateur Photographers; these flowers are an example of limitations the environment may place on you. We were on a boardwalk around the Old Faithful Geyser. You can’t step off the boardwalk, and it’s a little hard to lay down with other tourists walking along.
As usual, you never have the right lens on the camera. I had my shorter lens (35-80mm), mostly for scenery and wider angle shots. The longer lens (80-200mm) might have let me get “closer” to the plants even though I was on the boardwalk.
My thinking had been the short lens for close-ups and the long lens for wildlife off in the distance. I ended up using the long lens more than I had expected.
Just as a gratuitus addition, here’s a Texas Paintbrush for comparison.
When we first got to the park (East Entrance) I was concerned that we might not see many wildflowers. There were 3 and 4 foot drifts of snow. Parts of the road driving in had signs “No Stopping - Avalance Danger.” It wasn’t encouraging.
Wildflowers are opportunists, however. The next morning we hiked around on the boardwalks of Upper Geyser Basin. There was plenty of yellow from the Monkeyflowers. They were taking advantage of the heat being released by the thermal features.
Some of my photos were more for context, i.e. what was surrounding the flowers or what was their environment. That’s the case for the Yellow Monkeyflowers, taking over an embankment.
My closeup suffered a bit from what the auto-focus latched onto.
Finally, our first Mystery Flower. And our first slightly less than in focus example of amateur photography.
My camera has auto-focus. If it can’t get a “lock” it won’t shoot the photo. There are ways around it, but I thought I’d locked on the flowers. In the event, the lock was more on the leaf, when you blow the photo up to actual pixels you get blurred petals.
By way of assisting the identification process I’ve included 2 shots. The first, shows the very distinct branching of the stems (I’m sure that’s not correct from a botany standpoint).
The second photo is more of a complete plant/cluster.
The photos were take during the Upper Geyser Basin hike.
My quick look at the plastic foldout card for Yellowstone seemed to look like Common Tansy. A different reference had a photo of Sweet Fennel that had little clusters of yellow plants. Neither of these are listed as common on the Yellowstone Wildflower Sheet.
I’m leaning toward Sulfur Buckwheat since it is found parkwide.
But I wide open to suggestions. So comment away.
