Close look at flowers...

What are we going to see today... Not much, actually, but some nice varieties (I hope). And I think some of them are not uncommon, but we just don't look down on them and completely miss them as we pass by. Let's start with this red lily... Daylily, actually, but who cares!

 

The next one is just crazy... It's bright, it's bushy and each flower has such an attractive centerpiece. Also I found that it has no petals... I mean it has one solid circular petal. The name of this beauty is Butterfly Bush (also known as Summer Lilac or Orange Eye). Native to East Asia, this vigorous bush is highly ornamental. It carries the name because its flowers are a valuable source of nutrition nectar for butterflies. It is also highly toxic, so keep your distance and don't chew it!

We'll pass a Shrubby cinquefoil strewn with attractive yellow flowers, as well as Japanese beetles (not surprised, because they both are native to Japan). Click here to learn more about beetles - A few minutes of beetle's life...

 

Next stop we will have at Milkweed. It's delicious, isn't it? So beetles are feeding on its leaves all the time. 

But I am more interested in its pods these days. Every day they grow bigger and bigger and look so unusual... And... I just found that they are edible (I doubt I'll ever try them from the plant grown in the city, but still)...

What's left when the Cholla flowers are gone? The craters ;) And also some leaves on  thorns... Interesting plant this cholla...

One of these days we will spend more time looking at the Russian Sage, but let's peek at the flowers now, aren't they beautiful? And highly attractive to bees too, but I'll save that story for later.

The next one was a huge surprise for me to discover. Firstly, because it is small... Puncture vine crawls on the rocky surface and we walk on it, but rarely pay attention to it. But once you lower your eyes, you can find thorny leaves and small (I mean it, they are smaller than your pinky nail) yellow flowers. First I learned that flowers are opened in the morning and closed by noon. Is the sun too hot? Too hot for the devil? This is another name for this flower - the Devil's-thorn. And here is why - the Devil's-thorn is a poisonous plant. The fruit consists of burs with sharp spines which can puncture the skin of humans and animals. They can also rupture a bicycle tire and penetrate shoe soles. The leaves contain compounds known as saponins, which are toxic to livestock. I was attracted to smalllll yellow flowers and had no idea what could come of it ;) Really Devil's-thorn...

Prickly Lettuce. We've met this plant several times already. It has nice sharp-edged leaves and small, delicate yellow flowers. But today I learned what the seeds look like. And, I guess, now I know why these plants can be found so much here and there - the seeds just fly from here to there. But by the way, did you know Milk thistle (another name for this plant) is the closest wild relative of cultivated lettuce? Even though Prickly lettuce is widely considered a weed, it can be used for culinary purposes. Leaves of this plant contain bitter milky latex, which is mostly used as a condiment or to add more flavor to the salads. Need to keep it in mind and bring some home when we run out of fresh lettuce....

What else? A couple of flowers that we usually call umbrellas. Right, I know, they have names, but who cares about names when the nickname is so much better? 

And the red rose, still fresh despite the hot weather, will cover today's story.

 Pictures were taken on July 03, 2020.