Wildflower journey into the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina — 2013-05-11

Alan Cressler (a friend from Atlanta, Georgia) had recently told me that he wanted to photograph Rhododendron vaseyi, Pinkshell Azalea. I told him that I knew a very good location for this beautiful native azalea on North Carolina Hwy. 215, near the Blue Ridge Parkway. So, we made plans on Saturday to meet somewhere in between and drive up to the site. Another mutual friend from Atlanta, Steve Bowling, joined Alan on his trip over to join me on the Parkway.

The day started out sunny, but soon became quite cloudy — thunderstorms were predicted for the entire area in the afternoon. However, cloudy skies are perfect for photography, since the clouds diffuse the light and prevent harsh shadows. As we drew near the Rhododendron vaseyi site, it began to lightly sprinkle rain. Of course, it was not enough rain to cause us to amend our plans, so we pulled off the road,  gathered our gear, and walked down to the plants from our parking spot.

This particular native azalea is stunning. The delicate pink color is unlike any that I’ve seen in other native wildflowers:

Although most of the plants were on growing above a cliff face next to the road, there were a number of them within easy reach, so we managed to get some closer shots. On a trip I made to this site a few days earlier, the wind had been fierce, making it a challenge to get a crisp shot of the flowers. In that area of the Blue Ridge Mountains, strong winds are the norm, especially after noon, when the sun sets up atmospheric convection currents. That is one good reason for getting out early in the day before the sun can heat the land and start the convection current winds.

Here is a set of images of these beautiful flowers:

While Alan and Steve were taking shots of the Pinkshell Azalea, I discovered a few Halesia monticola or Mountain Silverbell trees in full bloom:

An interesting side note is that Hwy. 215 runs only slightly into Jackson County, North Carolina for a distance of about 1 mile (1.6 km). Coincendentally, along this mile is where these plants perfer to grow in fairly large numbers. They can be found farther up in elevation on the Blue Ridge Parkway, but in fewer numbers.

Just before we arrived at the junction of Hwy. 215 and the Blue Ridge Parkway, we pulled over to an area that had previously been pointed out to me by my friend, Janie Marlow, webmaster for Name That Plant, which is “A clearinghouse of information about native and naturalized plants of the Carolinas and Georgia”. She had told me that this is an area that is “botanically interesting”. I had to find out what she meant. Here are images of some of the plants we found at this site, starting with two color forms of Pedicularis canadensis or Canadian lousewort:

Although the trees are fully leafed out at much lower elevations, at this elevation (~4500 feet or 1371 meters), there were very few leaves on any of the trees — basically very early spring. However, the mountain sides were covered with numerous Amelanchier laevis or Serviceberry trees — one of the first trees to bloom at this altitude. I wish I had made a wide-angle shot of these trees blooming on the mountain sides, but I did get a closeup shot of a cluster of the flowers at the end of a tree branch:

At this point, we were less than a mile from the Parkway, and we still had several locations which I had on my list to visit. So we packed up and drove to the first of these locations on the Parkway — Graveyard Fields Overlook. Here is a description of this fabulous place from the previous link:

“Graveyard Fields” is the name of a high, flat mountain valley where the Yellowstone Prong of the Pigeon River originates. Surrounded by mountains exceeding 6000′ in elevation, the base of the valley is itself over 5000′, which accounts for some of its unique characteristics. A variety of hiking trails wind throughout the valley for your exploration.

The area certainly has an interesting name, and there are several theories about what might have lent the moniker. A natural explanation for it originates from a time when a windstorm blew down hundreds of the spruce and fir trees that originally grew here. The upturned roots supposedly resembled gravestones in a graveyard.

But there is a man-made explanation as well. During the early 1900’s, when the mountains were being extensively logged, all that remained in this valley were the stumps of cut trees. Over time, mosses eventually grew all over the stumps, resembling an overgrown graveyard.

However, later during the logging era, catastrophic fires swept through the area, destroying anything resembling a graveyard and heating the soil enough to sterilize it. The once dense spruce-fir forest was forever changed from that point forward. Plants to this day have trouble growing in the nutrient-poor soils, although trees, shrubs, and grasslands are slowly replenishing it and will eventually take over once again.

Here is a shot of the valley from the Graveyard Fields Overlook I took in October a few years ago:

One of the unusual shrubs that I wanted to show to Alan and Steve is the highly poisonous Pieris floribunda with the common names of Mountain Andromeda and Mountain Fetterbush. This shrubby plant can be as tall as 6 feet (~2 meters) and, in season, is covered with thousands of tiny white flowers. It is not common but can be found in large number in the area of Graveyard Fields:

Just down the road from the parking lot and in the same general area as the Mountain Andromeda, we found an entire hillside covered with Erythronium umbilicatum ssp. monostolum or Trout Lily. Personally, I’ve never seen populations that were as dense as these. They were carpeted against the hillside so thickly that the ground was not visible. It was somewhat of a chore to find single or small groups of flowers:

While Alan and I were photographing these wonderful yellow beauties, Steve wandered to the top of the ridge and soon called out that he had found some Trillium erectum, also known as Erect Trillium, Wake Robin, and Stinking Benjamin. The latter name comes from the “wet dog” aroma that is easily detected if one gets very close to the flowers.

So far, we were extremely pleased at finding an unexpected number of wildflowers. At the top of the ridge, there was an “unofficial” trail that appeared to lead back to the parking area at Graveyard Fields. We decided to take this trail back to the car and in a short distance we saw a few Trillium plants that had just progressed far enough that we could see a bit of color in the tips of the buds. The leaves were quite dark — much darker than other Trillium plants I had recently seen. Steve told me that he thought these were Trillium undulatum or Painted Trillium. I was quite excited about that, since I had not photographed this species in many years. I told Steve and Alan that I would definitely be coming back to the area in a week to see them in bloom.

About ten more feet down the trail, I caught a sparkle of white out of the corner of my eye, and it turned out to be a pair of Painted Trilliumin perfect bloom! This had definitely made my day:

Here are more images of Painted Trillium that we found at this site and later, down the road a bit along the Parkway:

That last shot (above) shows a group of fourteen Painted Trillium growing in the woods just next to the Parkway. Alan spotted these after we had turned around at Looking Glass Rock Overlook and were heading back home. Here is a shot of Looking Glass Rock (in the Pisgah National Forest) from the Overlook:

Near the woods where we found the many Painted Trillium, we also saw a number of large groups of Anemone quinquefolia or Wood Anemone just beside the Parkway:

As we were making our way back to our turn off of the Parkway, here and there were scattered many tall shrubs with a number of rather large clusters of white flowers at the end of each of its branches. Steve pointed out that these are Viburnum lantanoides or Hobblebush. Supposedly it gets its common name from the maze of “hobbles” it creates for hikers when its limbs droop to the ground and root in place:

As we neared the place where Alan had left his car earlier that morning, we stopped for him to photograph a Fraser Magnolia flower. While he was doing that, I busied myself shooting some fantastically colored Trillium catesbaei or Catesby’s Trillium flowers. Sometimes, Catesby’s Trillium flowers open as bright white. As they age, the petals will become pink, then change over to a deep rose color. One flower that I saw at this site was a brighter, deeper rose color than I had ever seen in a Catesby’s Trillium. It’s a bit beat-up from the constant wind, but I just had to record this extreme color:

The wind was howling through the gorge, and it was a challenge for me to keep the plants still enough to try to get a decent image. These few shots represent only a fraction of the number of shots I took of these colorful Trillium flowers.

Just about back to the place where Alan has left his car, he mentioned that on the way up the mountain, he had seen a brightly colored Rhododendron calendulaceum or Flame Azalea growing down the slope next to the highway. After some searching, we found the spot where this stunning azalea was growing. Its flowers can only be properly described by showing you a couple of images of its red-orange flowers:

I’ve noticed in recent years that I’m seeing fewer and fewer of these azaleas growing along frequently traveled spots. I attribute this to people digging these wild plants and taking them home to place in their gardens. Too bad, since that leaves fewer of them to be enjoyed by others.

What a way to end a spectacular day of botanizing in the Blue Ridge Mountains with a couple of great friends. I would hope that everyone could have such an experience, but that would mean that you should be outside instead of reading my blog! 😉 Maybe another day, eh?

— Jim