#plants of washington state

[thebashfulbotanist]

A plant I had been hoping to see for years! This is a striped orchid, Corallorhiza striata. There are a few Corallorhiza species where we go hiking in Washington State, but this one is one of the less common to see. You're more likely to spot C. maculata or C. mertensiana, called spotted and Pacific coralroots, respectively. I found this one on the Olympic Peninsula while backpacking up the Elwha.

Corallorhiza orchids, the coralroots, are mycoheterotrophic, meaning they parasitize mycorrhizal fungi instead of using photosynthesis like most plants. This means they'll just die if someone tries to cultivate them, which is honestly probably a good thing, given how threatened orchids are by poaching.

[colorsoutofearth]

Washington forest by Jack Dykinga

[macphoto]

Bogbean🌱 4.12.23

[emaadsidiki]

District of Columbia 🌳⛲🌿 TBT

[pnwnativeplants]

"Wherever they appear (or reappear), the presence of wolves makes an impact, but not just symbolically or politically. Wolves are a keystone species that play a vital role in and bring balance to ecosystems.

For example, the now-famous 1995 reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone National Park led to a surprising number of positive impacts for ecosystems in the region. Without their primary predator, elk had overgrazed much of the park. The resulting loss of vegetation negatively impacted populations of mice and rabbits, as well as the animals that prey on them. Songbirds found fewer available nest sites.

Even bears were impacted as the elk out-competed them for the berries they relied on. In riparian areas throughout the park, the absence of wolves had even more drastic impacts. Overgrazing in riparian areas led to erosion and stream sedimentation and a reduction of the abundance of beavers, fish, insects, birds, and river otters, compromising the health of entire aquatic systems. With wolves back in the mix, the ecosystem rebounded."

[reasonsforhope]

"Around the capital beltway or Washington’s famous Rock Creek Park, you may see a group of people ripping up vines along the treeline beside the roads.

If you have then you’ve glimpsed superheroes who traded in their capes for gardening gloves and their time for the satisfaction of terminating an invasive species and saving a native tree.

Washington D.C’s “Weed Warriors” are a group of volunteers going back to 1999 that work for free to keep hundreds of species of invasive shrubs, vines, and climbers from taking over native ecosystems.

Among the 600 or so non-native invasive plant species found in and around our nation’s capital, some like Polygonum perfoliatum, also known as “mile-a-minute” vine, can be devastating. Suffocating trees by overgrowing the leaves in their canopy branches, mile-a-minute can kill thousands of trees every year.

Since 1999, Weed Warrior volunteers have logged over 135,000 hours of time weed whacking in Montgomery County alone. Anyone can become a Weed Warrior; the group works in units for two-hour spaces removing weeds or planting native species in their place.

These invasive species management events are led by specially-trained volunteer Weed Warrior Supervisors and/or staff from the Montgomery Parks Dept. Warriors can get certified to de-weed in their spare time, or lead events on their own. They can even have their own unique patch of ground in the D.C.-Metro area to control.

Why would anyone want to trade their free time or laboring hours away for free doing something our tax dollars are supposed to do for us? The answer is simple: it’s addicting.

“If I have any good mental health, it’s due to Weed Warrioring,” said 74-year-old area resident Barbara Francisco. “You have a sense of accomplishment.” ...

The Weed Warriors website states that non-native, invasive plant species (NNIs) can alter the complex webs of plant-animal associations that have evolved over thousands of years to such a degree that plants and animals once familiar to us are eliminated...

Anyone who feels this is something they want to contribute their time to can go to the Montgomery County Parks website here and look at the upcoming Weed Warrior events—the next one is October 21st."

-via Good News Network, October 12, 2023

[materialsscienceandengineering]

Plant-based substitute for fossil fuels developed for plastic foams

An environmentally-friendly preparation of plant material from pine could serve as a substitute for petroleum-based chemicals in polyurethane foams. The innovation could lead to more environmentally friendly versions of foams used ubiquitously in products such as kitchen sponges, foam cushions, coatings, adhesives, packaging and insulation. The global market for polyurethane totaled more than $75 billion in 2022. A Washington State University-led research team used an environmentally-friendly preparation of lignin as a substitute for 20% of the fossil fuel-based chemicals in the foam. The bio-based foam was as strong and flexible as typical polyurethane foam. The researchers report on their work in the journal ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering.

Read more.

[christmaslightssalesman]

University of Washington, in bloom. 2024.

This will be one of MANY cherry blossom posts. I apologize ahead of time.

[shadesofmauve]

Becoming one with the bog

It was technically a 'poor fen', not a bog in the strictest sense, because it's ground-and-surface water fed, not reliant entirely on rain. It's still on the acid side of neutral and dominated by sphagnum moss. The acid and lack of oxygen in the water mean the plant matter doesn't fully decay, which forms the 'peat' of the peat bog, and the sphagnums help make sure it all stays that way.

The peat fen is a sensitive ecosystem, and it's totally possible to sink one of the 'dry' feeling hummocks (they're NOT dry, they're lying; sphagnum can hold a huge amount of water), so you don't walk from hummock to hummock; you avoid them and wade through the water and mud.

It makes very satisfying SSHCHLORP and GLOOOP sounds, stealthily tries to eat your feet if you stand still too long, and it bounces. The ground was actually something like 20 feet below us; we were walking on the peat. I think they said that 90% of the water was in that peat, with 5% below and 5% above. Not sure I've got the numbers right, but picture a giant neutrally buoyant sponge. With a landscape on top of it. It is sproingy.

Bounce, and the shrubs and stunted trees bounce with you, or whatever that saying is.

We saw three species of carnivorous plants. I didn't get a picture of the bladderwort, but the left is a Washington native sundew, and the right is sticky false asphodel, which was only discovered to be carnivorous in 2021.

I also took lots of pictures of pond lilies, which aren't specific to this environment but are really cool looking:

They also make it warmer inside their flowers. That's part of why all the lil' bugs are there! Pond lilies be making it cozy. Swamp lantern (skunk cabbage) also generate heat — and they create their own little 'wells'; clear space in the sphagnum hummocks. None of my pictures captured it well, but it's quite weird. Like little variations on the massive "plant shaping it's environment" theme that the sphagnum moss started.

And that, it turns out, is the true lure and danger of the fen. Not just that it could schloop you under (I only fell on my ass once, and it was sproingy). Not will-o-the-wisps. No, the true mystery is the sphagnum hillocks themselves.

Mounds of moss rising a foot or more above the water, red, brown, chartreuse, and yellow. They look like little hills, but it's moss, moss, moss, all the way down. You can wiggle your hand right down inside it. It's incredibly soft, and it's warm.

I can just imagine someone, weary from their bog slog, starting to miss their footing in the gloop, falling prey to the siren song of the Forbidden Coziness. They lay down (crushing numerous delicate plants as they do). They wriggle in. They fall asleep.

Several thousand years later, a lucky archeologist finds another bog body.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Harrison Ray and Noah Dowe at MMFA:

Following the arrest of Tufts graduate student Rümeysa Öztürk, right-wing media were quick to cast her as a “pro-Hamas radical.” According to new reporting, however, the State Department had determined ahead of her arrest “that the Trump administration had not produced any evidence showing that she engaged in antisemitic activities or made public statements supporting a terrorist organization,” despite the Department of Homeland Security’s claims that Öztürk “engaged in activities in support of Hamas.”

Öztürk was arrested despite a lack of “any evidence” that she “engaged in antisemitic activities or made public statements supporting a terrorist organization"

On March 25, federal immigration agents arrested Tufts University graduate student Rümeysa Öztürk over supposed “activities in support of Hamas.” In an emailed statement to The Washington Post, the Department of Homeland Security claimed that “DHS and [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] investigations found Öztürk engaged in activities in support of Hamas.” The Post also reported that the Trump State Department had accused Öztürk of supporting Hamas, apparently over an op-ed Ozturk co-authored last year for the Tufts student newspaper “criticizing the university’s response to the Israel-Gaza war.” To date, Öztürk has not been charged with any crime, but her student visa has been revoked and she has been relocated to a detention center in Louisiana. [The Associated Press, 3/26/25; Politico, 4/3/25; The Washington Post, 4/13/25; WBUR, 4/11/25]

Secretary of State Marco Rubio “did not offer specifics” on Öztürk’s detainment, but he suggested that his criteria for revoking visas includes “vandalizing universities, harassing students, taking over buildings, creating a ruckus.” At a news conference, Rubio told reporters, “Every time I find one of these lunatics, I take away their visas.” [The Washington Post, 3/27/25]

According to The Washington Post, the State Department had determined prior to Öztürk’s arrest that “the Trump administration had not produced any evidence showing that she engaged in antisemitic activities or made public statements supporting a terrorist organization.” The State Department memo, according to the Post, appeared to undermine the administration’s claims and “said Secretary of State Marco Rubio did not have sufficient grounds for revoking Öztürk’s visa under an authority empowering the top U.S. diplomat to safeguard the foreign policy interests of the United States.” [The Washington Post, 4/13/25] 

Right-wing media pump out the baseless claim that Rümeysa Öztürk was “associated with Hamas.”

[eopederson]

Theobroma cacao, United States National Botanical Garden Conservatory, National Mall, Washington, DC, 2017.

[thebashfulbotanist]

Trillium season is upon us in the Pacific Northwest! Crisp white Trillium ovatum are popping up all over the lowland forests. We're seeing lots of beetles pollinating them. In a few weeks, the flowers will turn pink or even maroon!

[maddiedorrell45]

New here let's reblog let's be friends

[emaadsidiki]

Minnesota pink and green granite hexagonal monolith. ⛲🌹

[pnwnativeplants]

Photo by Hazel Zen

[lumiii-nescent]

Blackberry blossom🌸✨