Hello everyone on this rather cool and cloudy day in July.  We seem to be getting a lot of cooler than normal weather this summer, especially this month.  And this is normally our hottest month of the summer.  Doesn’t look like it this year though.  I think we had more warm days in June than we are getting this month.  Maybe August will be better?  I don’t think I will hold out much hope for that idea.

But since the weather is not cooperating much I thought maybe it’s time for another walk by the river.  However, this is not a recent walk, but one from before.  I wanted to take pictures of all the wildflowers I could find that day along this beautiful path.  And there was a lot too.  So, some nice bright flowers are a good thing to help brighten the cool weather around here today.

We actually have somewhere around 300 or more wildflowers in this area, including many different orchids, though most of the orchids are small except for the lady slippers. But even the small ones are still very beautiful, but some are quite plain looking and easy to overlook.  And some of the flowers have odd additions to their name such as the words weed or bane, even though they are very nice wildflowers.

Aside from the river path itself, there are other paths along the way to the river that split from the main path.  One path just goes in a circle and ends up at the beginning.  Unfortunately that path goes through some low lying areas that right now are very wet because of all the rain we have had recently.  But even with all the rain and water lying around now, there are no mosquitoes, at least not yet, and it usually doesn’t take long for them to come out.

I haven’t actually been down to the river for a while now, so all these pictures were taken about 10 days ago or so.  Oddly I haven’t seen any chipmunks anywhere along that path, but there are squirrels living the old fashioned way by eating the seeds from pine and balsam cones.  A lot of work for little food.  But they don’t complain about it.  They just gather the cones and eat.  And those pine cones are not easy to open.  Just try using a hammer and chisel.  They use their little teeth.  And they go fast.

However, today is about wildflowers.  Such as the fireweed.  It is so named because it is one of the first plants to grow after a forest fire and can often turn a blackened area into a sea of pink or purple flowers and that helps to attract pollinating insects back to the devastated area as well as providing the nectar needed for surviving insects such as bees.  They are a favorite flower for bees and butterflies.

I did discover some other interesting things the last time I was down at the river, but that will have to wait for another day.  Well, that is all for now everyone, I hope you all have a wonderful remainder to your week and God bless!

Steve and Muffin.

© 2019 Steve McLeod.