A familiar weed of lawns, fields, roadsides, and gardens, this plant and its close relatives are the only species eaten by beautiful monarch butterflies.
This humble plant is easily overlooked, both in its quiet early blooming and later leaf unfurling. You can find it in wetlands and riverine forests in the NE quarter of the US, up into Canada.
These plants CAN be a nuisance, with some species having stinging hairs… BUT they are edible and highly nutritious, with various other uses as well!
Birders in the eastern half of America welcome this bird as one of their most colorful and recognizable, with its classic blue plumage, contrasted with a little red and white
Known in some areas as a pest, the “rice bird” who feeds on rice and grains especially during migration, this New World Blackbird has unique coloration featuring a male with high-contrast white and cream on black.
The brilliant blue, white, or pink of these flowers are actually 5 to 25 colored sepals rather than petals. They appear to float upon a mist of thread-like bracts above feathery, pinnately divided leaves.
The local Philippines call this woody vine “tayabak”. Related to the green beans we grow in our gardens, this species’ unique turquoise claw-shaped flowers are pollinated by bats.
A low-growing “trefoil” weed of lawns and disturbed, nitrogen-poor soil, distinguished by its tiny hop-like yellow flower clusters, pointed tips on each leaflet, and the terminal leaflet on a longer stalk or petiole