The first day of spring is a little more than a week away, on March 20th. If you look closely, you can already find redbuds flowering, but these trees aren't yet in their full splendor. In preparation for the show, let's relive past glories. Below, we have a few photographs taken by a local Highland Neighborhood resident, Mr. Bill Moe. All photos were taken by Mr. Moe one afternoon in the spring of 2011, a decade ago. Since all of the photos were taken on one day, it will be interesting to see this year if we can find all of the same flowers blooming at the same time.
 |
The Student Union Building is pictured in the background, and a flowering redbud is pictured in the foreground. Among the pretty, pink-purple flowers you can also see a handful of the 'persistent fruits'. In the middle-ground, it looks like one of the remaining on-site native post oaks is covered in yellow-green catkins.
|
 |
Mr. Moe snapped an up-close look at a globe of bright yellow flowers. This fragrant wildflower is called butterweed (Senecio glabellus). We do not have a designated location for butterweed; we just hope that it comes back every year. It's typically found in the wet areas of the arboretum.
|
 |
In 2011, dewberry (Rubus trivialis) was abundant in the arboretum, and it is still abundant today. This is very much a weed in the arboretum, especially in the wet areas. There are several marked spots for dewberry. We like this spiny vine for both the white flowers and the delicious black berries.
|
 |
These flowers look larger than life! In person, these are small wildflowers, but they really catch the eye when there is a grouping of them. This is commonly called pink-sorrel or wood-sorrel. The Latin name is Oxalis articulata. During the spring, there are typically several prominent patches in the arboretum.
|
