Wild Carrot

 Wild carrot (Daucus carota)

Today I saw a wild carrot in the marsh. Strange because this plant prefers well drained soil. Perhaps that's why there were very few species around: it's just not their preferred habitat.

Update. Queen Anne rules in august. Wild carrot is everywhere. Poison hemlock is almost completely disappeared and was replaced by daucus carota.

Wild carrot plant, when seen in profile, has a "collar" right below the umbrella. "Queen Anne wears collar". Here is the picture:

Wild carrot in profile

When looking at wild carrot plant, notice that some of them have flat umbrellas and others have round ones. Here is an example with round umbrella:

 Wild carrot with round umbrella

Here is the picture of the wild carrot umbrella, view from the top.

Wild carrot flowers

Wild carrot is also known by its popular name Queen Anne's lace. It has solid stem. The stem is also hairy ("Queen Anne has hairy legs") or rather fuzzy. On the above picture you can also see some of the fern-like leaves. The plant is supposed to smell like carrot tops but I could not smell anything. When I tried some root, I could detect very faint carrot smell.

Here is the picture of the leaf and stem:

The leaf and stem of the wild carrot

Another identifying feature of wild carrot is one or several dark flowers in the middle of florescence but not every plant has them. At certain stage in plant's life this flower can be seen elevated over the rest of the bloom. This particular specie had several very dark purple flowers. I got a close up of the center.

Wild carrot dark flowers

If you pick wild carrot for medicinal or consumption purposed (young roots are reputed to be edible) be sure to identify it correctly as it does look very similar to other plants in carrot family, especially poison hemlock. To give you an example, right there in the marsh next to the wild carrot grows another plant, that belongs to the carrot family and looks strikingly similar.

Update. I have tried eating wild carrot roots and I say they are too woody to eat. 

Wild carrot is biannual. Later in life the bloom folds in resembling a bird's nest.

Wild carrot bloom as a "bird's nest"

Water parsley bloom

The plant above is water parsley. It's edible and I have tried it. The stems of parsley are smooth and hollow.

Cinquefoil

Silverweed cinquefoil or argentina anserina is a plant found mainly in marshes. It has yellow flowers like buttercup but the leaves are different. The plant is also known as common silver weed or just silver weed. The Latin name argentina means silver.The plant is part of the Rose family (Rosaceae)

The name cinquefoil (without silverweed part) usually refers to a related but different plant potentilla that resembles strawberry. Like strawberry and silverweed it also belongs to Rose family.

Argentina leaves

The leaves are composite, serrated and very shiny.

Silverweed flower

Thimbleberry

 Thimbleberry bush

Thimbleberry is a common sight in a redwood forest. It's a shrub with rounded deeply lobed leaves. Right now it's blooming.

Thimbleberry belongs to the Rose family, to which such plants as blackberry, raspberry and strawberry also belong. You can actually see some family resemblance. 

Thimbleberry flower

It means that very soon we'll see some thimbleberry berries. Perhaps, thimbleberry pie?

Poison Oak

 Poison oak

Poison oak is widespread all over California and other places. It growth in abundance in the south as well as in the northern parts. However in the south the plant is rather scrawny while in the north it looks like a perfect look alike of a European oak. It has three distinctive leaves. It is easy to take this plant for the real oak, either black oak of the south or European oak.

Laurel

 Rockefeller Forest near Avenue of the Giants

California Bay or laurel is a fairly rare plant but we found a few young sprouts (not big enough yet to be considered a tree) in a redwood forest. It's a tree with narrow dark green shiny leaves that have strong pleasant aroma, hence bay leaves are often used as condiment in cooking.

Laurel

Wild Ginger

Well, today I found it. But before we delve into exploring wild ginger, I checked the Wikipedia. It turns out there are several varieties of plants, referred to as wild ginger. We shall talk about Asarum caudatum, the one that belongs to Aristolochiaceae family.  The other one is Alpinia, it belong to proper Ginger family (Zingiberaceae).

Asarum can be easily confused with false lily-of-the-valley, their leaves have similar heart shape. There is a way to tell though: lily's leaves are smooth and shiny and the veins run parallel to each other in curves. Here is the picture:

False lily-of-the-valley

Wild ginger's leaves are more rounded, matte (not so shiny) and the veins pattern is more spread out. They also have fuzz around them. Here is the picture of wild ginger leaves:

Wild ginger (Asarum)

I even found a flower on one of them. It's not at its best but it does give an idea what it looks like:

Wild ginger flower

The plant is supposed to smell like ginger if you rub the leaves but I could not detect any ginger aroma. In fact it did not have any aroma at all.

Cow Parsnip

Cow parsnip is another plant of the Umbelliferae family featuring its signature umbrella shaped little flowers. Cow parsnip has huge leaves and can grow quite tall. The plant is very sturdy, has thick stems, somewhat hairy and hollow inside. Its Latin (botanical) name is Heracleum maximum, meaning "big" (like in Hercules).

Cow parsnip at Arcata marsh

Cow parsnip has really big leaves, easily recognizable.

Cow parsnip leaves

And here some good close-up of flowers

Cow parsnip umbrella, top view

And here a close-up umbrella in profile

Cow parsnip umbrella, side view

Interestingly, we found only one place where the cow parsnip grew and the patch was overgrown with all kinds of plants. But we saw it outside of marsh too, it's fairly common but not too common. Incidentally, I have read that cows don't like to eat it.

The juice of this plant contains phototoxin that reacts with the skin when exposed to ultraviolet rays. In other words, if you want to collect this plant, do it late in the evening (after sunset) or at night.

Angelica

 Angelica in the marsh

I have heard of angelica plant for quite a while. I know it is valued for its medicinal properties and I even bought dong quai (Chinese Angelica) root capsules and I found them very good. I have never seen it growing wild though. That is, until a few days ago when I took a walk in remote marsh in Humboldt Wildlife Refuge.

Angelica 

Here it was, growing at the far end of the loop trail. There were a few patches but all on the far end of the loop. It's like the plant did not want to be found. I felt like a detective who finally found a person he's been hunting for.

Angelica plant in profile

Notice reddish stem. They are not reddish all over though, just some parts of the stem, sometimes you'll see reddish tint on one side of the stem. In the above picture notice purple blotches on the lower part of the stem: it is a signature feature of poison hemlock but hemlock has purple blotches all over the stem. Actually I noticed that lots of the marsh plants have some purple blotches on the stem so don't use that as a single identifying feature.

Angelica

This is a more typical example. The plant has reddish stem but usually on one side and a few small reddish speckles. The stems of angelica are smooth and hollow.

Angelica leaves

The leaves of angelica are wide and not at all like hemlock's lacy leaves.  Finally, the bloom is quite different too: angelica has umbrella shape flowers typical for parsley family that later develop into a bunch of rounded florets (or whatever the botanical term is). Here is the picture:

Angelica bloom

Another identifying feature of angelica is that the plant has a nice aroma. Hemlock is supposed to smell like a mouse. I guess that means dusty.

So here you have it: a dossier for angelica compiled by yours truly. I hope to see more of this plant in the future.