Silene Gallica

Silene gallica in a meadow near beach

Silene gallica is a plant of the Pink family (Caryophyllaceae) that grows in meadow habitat. The plant is inconspicuous, with rather small pink flowers and hairy stems and leaves.The blooming period is short.

Silene gallica flowers

Ambrosia chamissonis

 Ambrosia chamissonis growing among the dunes

Ambrosia chamissonis (silver beach ragweed) is a plant that I have just recently discovered in our dunes. At first I though it was some kind of chenopodium: the triangular shape of leaves and striped stem led me to this opinion. However I quickly found out that it was Ambrosia or beach ragweed, a member of the Aster family (Asteraceae).

Ambrosia chamissonis leaves

So what's up with this plant who is masquerading as chenopodium when in fact it is an aster? It has leaves that can have different shapes: oval or deeply lobed. The leaves are fleshy but not quite as fleshy as those of succulents. The flowers are in a spike. The stems can be very hairy or just barely. Yet it has some kind of integral appearance and once you know it, it is easy to recognize. I guessed it was the same plant in spite of different shape of the leaves. The fruit is supposed to form a burr but I have not seen those yet.

Here is another picture of the flowers. An interesting thing was that the species with cut-leaves were blooming while the ones with triangular/oval shape were not.

Ambrosia chamissonis in bloom

And here is a picture of the stem:

Ambrosia chamissonis close-up of the stem

Want to see a hairy stem? Here it is:

Ambrosia chamissonis hairy stem

And one more:

Ambrosia chamissonis stem and leaves

Yes, I know I ran amok with this one.  But it is exciting to find some new plant and to be able to identify it quickly.

Like other plants with clusters of usually tiny or very small flowers ragweeds are wind pollinated. These kind of plants may cause hay fever because they need wind to have their pollen spread out unlike flowers that are pollinated by insects. Incidentally this Ambrosia happens to have male and female flowers growing on the same plant.

Why is this plant called Ambrosia (it's a Latin name, too)? Good question. It has smell, not unpleasant but nothing to invoke images of the famous food of the gods. I don't think it is even used as spice.The common name ragweed speaks for itself.

Corn Sandspurry

Corm sandspurry (Spergula arvensis)

Corm sandspurry (Spergula arvensis) is a plant that at first sight can be confused with Gilia millefoliata. They are both tiny inconspicuous plants and the leaves look somewhat similar. However, if you look close, you'll see that the flower structure of spergula is quite different: it has a big pistil in the middle while gilia has none.

Spergula arvensis

Spergula (and very similar to it  spergularia) are part of the Pink family (Caryophyllaceae), which also counts amonng its members such planrs as carnation (Dianthus), campion (Silene), chickweed (Stellaria) etc.

Here is a close-up of the flower of Spergula arvensis:

 Spergula arvensis

And just for comparison here is a picture of sticky sandspurry (Spergularia macrotheca). Notice how similar the flowers look: same distinctly visible petals and similar round pistil.

Spergularia macrotheca

Beach suncup

Beach suncup

Beach suncup is a very attractive plant with bright yellow flowers, rather small but not too small. Well, I like suncups. It looks very close to Sierra suncup, a desert plant. Suncups' Latin name is... well, in a minute. First, note that suncup is another name for evening primrose, so it follows that suncups belong to Evening primrose family (Onagraceae). Like other plants of this family it had 4 petal and cross-like shape of the stigma.

So about this Latin name. Well, the whole idea of the Latin name is to have a unique scientific name that is peculiar to one particular species. It is done for ease of identification because common names are a mess. There can be ten or more genera sharing the same common name. So botanists came out with scientific name for every plant discovered on the planet. However, I found that some plants have two or even more Latin names. This genus suncup and this beach suncup species in particular seems to have six (sic!) Latin names.

So, want to know these names? Here goes: Camissoniopsis cheiranthifolia. Then just listing the genus: Camissonia, Oenothera, Agassizia, Holostigma, Sphaerostigma. Six names in total! Could be even more. Obviously, we can't deal with them all. We'll just pick the most popular one: beach suncup or Camissonia cheiranthifolia.

It first forms a rosette and then shoot out a long stem from it.

Beach suncup (Camissonia cheiranthifolia)

Notice that beach suncup like its desert relative has red spots on the petals (never mind the bug):

Camissonia cheiranthifolia. Notice red spot on the petals.

And here is a picture of Sierra suncup, a plant often seen in a desert:

Sierra suncup (Camissonia sierrae) in the desert

Coast Buckwheat

Eriogonum latifolium

Another common plant in the dune habitat is coast buckwheat (seaside buckwheat). This plant is most easily recognized by its leaves, even when not in bloom. The leaves are coarse but not really fleshy and covered with white fuzz. The flowers are in clusters, the color varies from white to red. The stem can be short or rather long. It is not a vine.

Coast buckwheat (Eriogonum latifolium) is part of the Knotweed family (Polygonaceae) and you can see swollen joints on the stem. Here is picture that shows joints clearer:

Coast buckwheat (Eriogonum latifolium)

Here is a picture with more mature plant that turned pink:

Eriogonum latifolium in bloom

Beach Morning Glory

Beach Morning Glory (Calystegia soldanella)

Well, morning glory is not a glamorous plant but it is easy to identify, at least the beach variety. It has big pale lavender bell-shaped flowers with white streaks inside them and round leaves. Morning glory's Latin name is Calystegia soldanella, also known as Convolvulus soldanella. Note that even  botanists can't tell the difference between Calystegia and Convolvulus genera without microscope and sometimes they are grouped together. The difference is so minor that we do not need concern ourselves.

Calystegia is a Greeek word and means "a covering cup", referring to the cup-like shape of the flowers.  Convolvulus is a Latin word derived from the word convolvere, which mean to "wind" and refers to winding stems of the plants within the family. It is a vine. Morning glory, also known as bindweed makes a nice decorative plant that does not take any maintenance. Though commonly seen flowers are usually white or very pale, some species come in gorgeous bright colors, like for example dwarf morning glory (Convolvulus tricolor).

Well, as the name implies, this plant belongs to Morning glory family known as Convolvulaceae.

Calystegia soldanella grows on a long stem

By the way if you ever decide to photograph beach plants, don't be surprised as the amount of insects getting in your pictures. Little bugs love these plants. Well, with the flowers like this it has to be insect-pollinated, but I think the pollinating insects are ants and beach bugs rather than bees.

Beach Knotweed

 Beach knotweed among the Morning glory round leaves

Beach Knotweed (Polygonum paronychia) is one of the common plants that can be seen on the beach among the dunes. This plant is fairly easy to identify by its narrow green leaves and small white flowers. The blooming season lasts at least a month, perhaps more.

As the Latin name suggests, the plant is part of the Knotweed family (Polygonaceae) so look for the swollen or distinctive joints along the stem. The flowers are not the spike like lots of other genera but rather distinctive small white flowers.

Beach knotweed flower close-up

Searocket

Searocket. Notice the similarity to wild radish flowers.

Searocket (Cakile maritima) is another plant that can be seen among the dunes. It belongs to the Mustard family (Brassicaceae) as can be seen by its flower: notice the similarity to mustard and radish flowers. The flowers of searocket are small and pale mauve. As typical for other mustards, the mature plant produces pods.

Searocket (Cakile maritima) hiding among Ambrosia's leaves.

Note. The big leaves in two pictures actually belong to a different plant, Ambrosia chamissonis. But the leaves of searocket look very similar albeit much smaller. You can see some on the picture above. See my post about Ambrosia chamissonis.

Here is the picture of searocket leaves:

Searocket's leaves and flowers

Yellow Sand Verbena

Abronia latifolia on the beach

Let us leave the garden and take a walk on a beach. Dune habitat has its own plant life and although it might not be as exuberant and exciting as the forest or meadow, nevertheless there are some unique species there that are not found anywhere else. Usually these plant have "dune" or "beach" or "sand" as part of their common name. Sometimes it is a species peculiar to beach habitat wherefore other species of the same genus strive in different environment. An example of such a plant would be morning glory. It grows pretty much everywhere where thee is enough sunshine and moisture. The genus species in Latin is called Calystegia. There are quite a few. The most common species is Calystegia sepium. The beach morning glory species is Calystegia soldanella.

With verbena things are getting hairy. First of all, the common name verbena has nothing to do with the genus named Verbena (it's the Latin name too) which is part of the Verbenaceae family. Sand verbena in Latin is called Abronia and the yellow variety that we are interested in is called Abronia latifolia. (Latifolia means "with broad leaves".) Our friend arbonia belongs to Four O'Clock Family (Nyctaginaceae)

The flowers of Abronia latifolia are arranged in neat round heads. The leaves are succulent but rough to the touch. It can be seen on the beaches and dune habitat but the plant is not very common.

Nigella

Nigella

Nigella is an interesting garden plant that has a very distinctive appearance. The leaves are dill-like. The flowers are rather big, blue with a big protruding middle part with tentacle-like filaments (stamens?). I see it occasionally on the curbsides.

The seeds in some varieties are edible and known as black cumin or onion seeds (yeah, I know). Though the name cumin can refers to a couple of other plants. Nigella seeds are widely used in Indian cuisine.

Nigella is easy to grow in the garden. The plant is self seeding.

Nigella is part of the buttercup family (Ranunculaceae).

Nigella seed capsule

Nigella has dill-like leaves

Blue Star Creeper

I don't know how "wild" Blue Star Creeper plant is but so far I only saw it at the curbs and on some neglected looking lawns. I did some research about it and found out it's actually quite valuable garden/lawn plant, especially valued for its tolerance to be walked upon (like camomile) and therefore can be planted in cracks between stone slabs, tiles, pathways or wherever else you want to have flowers rather then dirt. The plant is very low growing (a creeper), the pale blue flowers are small but bright and cheerful and they certainly catch the eye.

Here is the picture of that curb:

Blue Star Creeper

And a little more close (notice the yellow spot in the middle):

Blue Star Creeper

And here is the picture of the single plant in a profile. It is rather small, about the length of a finger though on the ground it seems much shorter:

Blue Star Creeper

 Blue Star Creeper's Latin name is Isotoma fluviatilis. It belong to the family Campanulaceae. I don't know why, it certainly does not look like a bell flower to me but we leave the nomenclature to the botanists.

This flower can bloom for a long time until the frost gets it so it's perfect for permanent warm climate. Here it does not bloom in winters.

Gilia millefoliata

Gilia is a very small and inconspicuous plant that grows in meadows. There are several species in the genus, the one we'll look at today is called Gilia millefoliata, which translates literally as "thousand leaves" gilia. It grows in sand dunes habitat along the coastlines. The flowers are usually blue but very small though the stem can reach 5 or more inches. The stems are fuzzy. The leaves are similar to yarrow leaves. In fact common yarrow is known as Achillea millefolium.

Gilia is part of the phlox family (Polemoniaceae), together with such genera as polemonium (Jacob's ladder) and phlox. Do not confuse phlox with flax, which belongs to a different family (Linaceae).

Some time ago we went to plant exhibit and there were among others various species of phlox family. Well, one can hardly tell them apart. Just looking through my archives, there were such species as linanthus, collomia, phlox, the only difference being that some flowers were pink and some were white. I was not able to find any of them in the wild to give you pictures.

But we do have some good pictures of gilia. So here goes:

 Gilia millefoliata

The view of the flower from above:

 Gilia millefoliata

And just for fun along the same trail I happened to notice some yarrow so you can see the similarity in leaves. Millefoliata in gilia obviously does not apply to petals as there are only five of them therefore it must refer to pinnate (feather-like) leaves.

 Achillea millefolium

Johnny Tuck

Johnny tuck (Triphysaria eriantha) is a beautiful plant that grows rather low but attracts attention by its colourful flowers that are arranged around stem-like formation. The plant is part of the Broomrape family (Orobanchaceae) and you can see similarities in flower shapes with such notable members of the same family as owl's clover and yellow parentucellia (yellow bartsia).

Many member of Orobanchaceae are  root parasites meaning they attach themselves to the roots of other plant to obtain sustenance for themselves. Many plants are partial parasites meaning they can complete their life cycle independently from the host plant.

Here is a picture of johnny tuck.

Johnny tuck at the beach trail 

And here is a close-up

Johnny tuck

Note that sometimes this plant is refereed to as butter-and-eggs though this appellation is more commonly applied to another plant, Linaria vulgaris, also known as yellow or common toadflax.