Siskiyou Summits

Plant Sales and Open Gardens this Weekend!

Our own chapter members Carolyn Chamberlain and Sharon Maurin will open their gardens tomorrow afternoon (1-4 p.m.) for the annual Medford Garden Club sale. For their addresses and a list of available plants at their gardens and the garden of Bill Hunt, see the attached pdf file.

Saturday, Kathy Allen and Baldassare Mineo are ready to welcome you to their open gardens and encourage you to check out plants for purchase. Kathy’s is open 10-5, Baldassare’s garden visiting hours are 9-1 or by appointment. Plenty of space for socially distanced shopping at both locations.

Yreka Trip: Wildflowers of the Klamath

I took a solitary early May trip to the Yreka area hoping to find the Yreka phlox still in full bloom. Due to some hot days in late April/early May, the phlox was fading out, but I did find it and also the “ghosts” of some bitterroot flowers (Lewisia rediviva). The scabland rock gardens east of I-5, site of an old Chinese cemetery, also host a rare buckwheat, Eriogonum sphaerocephalum var. halimoides (below right), which was in bloom and drawing some wonderful pollinator action. Driving up into the mountains, I found Fritillaria recurva (below), Lewisia cotyledon in bud, Allium falcatum, Klamath plum in sweet-smelling bloom and many other spring beauties. Also saw a neat Cheilanthes rock fern which some of you might recognize. The best discovery of all? A single Siskiyou fritillary in bloom right next to me when I stopped to rest on a rock.
There were also plenty of butterflies out and about, especially the Sara Orange Tip. That’s because of the mustard species in bloom in the Klamath Mountains (see photo top right). You can also observe this same butterfly species in great numbers on the Table Rocks early in the season for the same reason: mustards blooming.

Field Trips
Speaking of Table Rocks, we should plan our Table Rocks hike in honor of Janet Crawford for a weekday evening soon. If we wait any longer, the rattlesnakes will be out. If you’d like to join me on an early June field trip to Lava Beds, let me know as soon as possible. The Monument features some intriguing pumice gardens as well as a large flora of sagebrush, grassland and forest species. This trip could also include some birding and possibly a look at a rare plant that’s endangered in the Klamath Falls area but I would need to arrange this part ahead of time, so please let me know if interested. Those of us who have lifetime passes can carry passengers into the Lava Beds Monument; otherwise, the entrance fee is $20. Contact info for field trips is Kathy Pyle, 541-324-3077, kmpyle2@yahoo.com.

Member News
Eric has recorded a series of Shakespeare sonnet readings for the “Rogue Plague Theater. “ You can catch Eric’s performances on Facebook.
Kathy Pyle has a new blog. It’s called “Field Station.” Find it on WordPress in her new website, Second Nature.

This Memorial Day, remember to stay safe and socially distant as you venture out into this new world of ours.

 Dear Chapter Members:

This Tuesday would have been our April meeting, under normal circumstances. However, we’re still staying home and saving lives until further notice. As soon as our planned April speaker August Jackson produces his pollinator lecture, I’ll pass along the link.

Want to go for a hike? Check out new videos on our YouTube SiskiyouSummitsTV channel. Early April hikes include the East Applegate Ridge Trail on April 1 and the Beekman Trail in Jacksonville last Sunday, April 5.

Group hikes will be announced as soon as it’s safe for us to hike together.

March Minutes from Lynn McDonald – They are attached to this email as a Word doc.

Nursery News –

Kathy’s Open Garden – Kathy Allen will start up her open gardens and plant sale on April 18, continuing through the week from Saturday to Saturday in order to stagger shoppers at the 6-foot social distance. Please plan accordingly.  Exact cash or checks will be welcome but at this time, Kathy is unable to make change. She says “There are plenty of plants to go around so no need to be here the first hour…. I have a great selection of plants in the nursery. I’ve been working hard to provide you with some new and interesting plants.” Visit Kathy’s Garden at 2850 Taylor Road in Central Point. Open the first week from 10-5 daily.

Shooting Star Nursery Perennials – Eric Hagerman reports that he is taking a brief hiatus from the nursery but recommends checking late this spring on the new perennials grown from plugs onsite. For now, two particular early-season recommendations are Glaucum flavum and Echium amoenum., as well as plentiful delospermum and sedum varieties.

What’s Blooming in Your Garden?
April is for Trilliums!

Top right, Trillium grandiflorum in the Beekman Arboretum, Jacksonville. Bottom right, here’s a trillium from mine, just opening up. It appears to be a Trillium kobayashi hybrid. Has been growing for at least a decade, hitchhiked in from a SNARGS plant sale purchase.

And Frits!
Open up and say recurva! Here’s a Fritillaria recurva from the Sterling Mine Ditch trail.

Dear Chapter Members,

Updates:
Since the governor issued an executive order of “stay home and save lives” last Monday, we will have to cancel our April 14^th meeting and postpone the Janet Crawford Memorial Table Rock hike and next Illinois Valley hike until late April at the earliest.

But we still have things to look forward to, beginning with a virtual event. The planned-for speaker at our April chapter meeting, August Jackson, is putting together an online talk on native bees. He will send us the link when it’s ready; I’ll forward it to you. August is an interpretive specialist at the Mt. Pisgah Arboretum in Eugene. He and his partner Amy spend time each summer observing and photographing pollinators, especially bumble bees, in eastern Oregon.

On another cheerful note, we now have a chapter YouTube channel. Just go to YouTube online and search for Siskiyou Summits TV.  Here’s the link to our first video, live from the Little Falls trail on 8 Dollar Mountain. Try your hand at creating videos on your smart phone and then share them with the group. They can also be linked from our chapter Facebook page.

What’s your favorite early spring flower? This is one of mine.

Does anyone have a spring poem to share? Send it my way. These lines are embossed on a field journal given to me by a dear friend: “Your head is a living forest full of songbirds.” Let them sing.

Happy Easter and Happy Spring.

Kathy Pyle

Photo: Eriogonum exploration at Rough and Ready by Kelley Leonard.

Happy March, everyone! This is Kathy Pyle taking over chapter news bytes from Margaret Meierhenry, who has done an admirable job of member communications.

Great news from our February auction: Chapter treasurer Bill McDonald reports that we raised $1023 in plant sale proceeds and $21 from book sales.

March 11^th Chapter Meeting:
Local author and environmentalist Luke Ruediger will highlight the wild places and wildflowers of the Applegate Siskiyous. Luke will present a sweeping view of the entire Applegate Watershed, with its many botanical areas, rare plants and habitats including riparian, arid foothill, and the Siskiyou Crest high country that serves as a biodiversity bridge between plants and animals of the Cascades and the Klamath-Siskiyous.

April 14^th Chapter Meeting:
Oregon Alpine Pollinator Ecology

Speaker August Jackson will present a program on his explorations and observations of  high-elevation pollinators, particularly in Eastern Oregon. August will highlight the native bee flora that visits our alpine wildflowers. Steens Mountain is a favorite destination for his research.

August Jackson is a naturalist and interpretive specialist for the Mt. Pisgah Arboretum in Eugene.

Bombus nevadensis photo by August Jackson.