Outdoors

If you have not taken a drive to see the wildflowers this year, now is the time to do it, for they will soon fade. Shrine Pass is always a delightful trip for wildflowers, and many can be seen without a great deal of walking. Arapaho Pass (west of Boulder) is also excellent but takes a bit longer and involves a bit more hiking. The unusual amount of moisture this year has made the wildflowers exceptional. Just last week friends of mine drove me to Bailey for dinner one evening, and the flowers along U.S. 285 were prolific, and the back roads were spectacular.

The wildflowers have been spectacular this year. I can’t quite get used to the peak bloom being in June, for I am accustomed to the peak of spring bloom being in May, for that is when the broad-leafed deciduous forests of western New York are carpeted in bloom. I had forgotten that the peak of bloom is in June in Colorado. What a glorious month it has been. Not only is it green from all the rain we now have had, but now all that verdant green is splattered with the color of various wildflowers.

Last week we took a brief look at the white clematis, or Western virgin’s bower. This week we will take a look at a very similar plant known as yellow clematis or Chinese clematis, formerly Clematis orientalis. This is the plant that is on the noxious weed list and which so many people are concerned about.

June has finally brought spring to the mountains. Our Evergreen World is GREEN, as green as I have seen it since last August when the drought turned everything to a uniform tan. Even the ponderosa pine trees had lost their scintillating sparkle. Now, after nearly a month of rainy weather, they are sparkling in the sunshine. The hills are green with evergreen trees, kinnikinnick and grasses, and the valleys are green with the new growth of willows.