Audio clip
David Haskell
Want to experience wildflowers this year? Open your eyes and step lightly.
“You don’t need to pin them with a name. Just appreciate their beauty, watch the bees on them and enjoy the sunshine — that’s the main joy of wildflowers,” said David Haskell, associate professor and chair of biology at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tenn.
Every spring, a dazzling array of wildflowers peaks in the southern Appalachians from March through May.
If you’re just starting to think about wildflowers, here are some tips for viewing:
1 Find the flowers.
Spring wildflowers prefer rich, deep soil in north-facing, sloped wilderness areas, experts say.
“Good places are areas that are not heavily grazed, not heavily impacted by development, not turned into pine plantations,” said Dr. Haskell.
You can always head out on an organized hike.
Forty species may be in bloom at the Pocket of Pigeon Mountain, near LaFayette, Ga., said Mike Christison, 65, a retired government worker from Marietta, Ga. and trip leader.
2 Don’t pick the flowers.
Picking wildflowers is prohibited on federal and state property.
Wildflower lovers point out that picking wildflowers, over time, harms the environment. Many nursery-sold plants, when uprooted from the wild, die after they’re replanted.
“If you enjoy nature the way you see it, remember to leave it the same for the next person,” said Paola Zannini-Craddock, horticulturist for Reflection Riding Arboretum & Botanical Garden.
When buying wildflowers for a garden, be sure the plants are nursery-propagated from responsibly gathered seed or cuttings. Reflection Riding (www.reflectionriding.org) sells thousands of nursery-propagated wildflowers at its spring plant sale. This year the sale is April 11-13.
3 Buy a guide.
Southeast Tennessee and northwest Georgia are blessed with wildflower experts. For a good guide, try:
n “Wildflowers of Pigeon Mountain,” by Jay Clark ($30, Waldenhouse)
n “Wildflowers of Tennessee,” by Jack B. Carman ($28, Highland Rim Press)
n “Wildflowers of Tennessee, the Ohio Valley and the Southern Appalachians,” by Dennis Horn and Tavia Cathcart ($23, Lone Pine Publishing).
4 See the flowers.
Take pictures, take notes, sketch. Borrow a small hand lens from a biologist, and get a closer view.
“You have to let go of being in a hurry, of wanting to get down the trail,” said Dr. Zannini-Craddock.
Stand back and appreciate a field (or suburban lawn) covered in spring beauties.
Last weekend, for example, about 30 people walked to the South Cumberland Regional Land Trust’s Bluebell Island on the Elk River to see fields of Virginia bluebell, masses of trillium, clumps of rue anemone, drifts of trout lilies and scattered spring beauties.
“It’s beautiful, and it’s all right here,” said visitor Carson Wright, a 19-year-old University of the South student.
“The Virginia bluebells are harbingers of spring, my favorite season,” said Sanford McGee, a Trust board member. “It’s like phoenix coming out of the ashes.”
