It was also an unexpected return to the Rockies, which we had dwelled in the shadow of for seven mind-numbingly dull autumn and winter months. We left before the summer season of high-mountain meadows were a smile on a self-satisfied and sated face. And here we were, 365 days later, granted a second chance at summer wildflowers in the Rocky Mts.
Many familiar faces bloomed around us including Glacier (Erythronium grandiflorum), Camas (Camassia quamash), and Avalanche lilies (E. montanum), Small-flowered Blue-eyed Marys(Collinsia parviflora), Hispid Paintbrush (Castilleja hispida), and Calypso Orchids (Calypso bulbosa). Each and everyone was a melodic stanza in a symphony of botany.
The Early Blue violets (Viola adunca) were new, or maybe they were something I had seen before, but this was the first time I was able to positively identify this particular species. Let's face it; violets are easy to take for granted, mostly because they are so common as well as so difficult to I.D. This one, once I took the time to not take it for granted, and to have a closer look, revealed itself to me in the form of the small spur protruding from the rear of the flower. Ah ha! I hadn't seen that in a western species before.
It makes me wonder how many other, spurless western violets I've been calling Early Blue, not knowing any better because I wasn't paying attention...
The Purple Virgin's Bower, or Rock Clematis (Clematis columbiana var. columbiana) was clearly something new, not to mention a bit of a startling sight, the blue-purple flowers dangling among the greenery of the woods. It is very similar to Western Virgin's Bower, or Western Clematis (Clematis occidentalis var. grosserrata), the identities of each boiling down to the leaves. My Montana species has compound leaves divided into three leaflets which in turn have leaflets; the leaflets of Western Clematis are not further divided into leaflets.
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