The Wildflowers of California

This seems to be a banner year for California wildflowers. Everywhere I go there are govs of poppies, popcorn flowers, fiddlenecks, lupines etc. etc. The poppies seem to be popping up in every nook and cranny and highway median. Over the past few years I've managed to learn the names of many of the most common flowers. Most of this comes from hiking with a Sierra Club leader who is quite knowledgeable. When I'm just walking with friends I usually have to look stuff up. Unfortunately most of the wildflower books I've seen come up short in the usefulness department. Northern California and the SF Bay region in particular has a lot of unique species and variations of species. Most California wildflower books are too broad, and not specific enough to the area. Usually I take a picture of the flower then look it up on the web when I get home. I do have on my shelf an old copy of Spring Wildflowers of the SF Bay Region, which my dad gave me to me. It doesn't have many color pictures, though the pen and ink drawings are good. Once I know a flower I can usually look it up here for more information but I generally have a hard time using it to identify an unknown.

In a similar vein, another old book from my dad The Wild Flowers of California has no color photos but fantastic line drawings of most but not all the flowers. The edition I have was published in 1966. The book was originally written in 1897, the original plates were destroyed along with most of San Francisco in 1906. The 1966 version is a full reprint of the 1907 edition. With no color pictures and no species introduced or discovered in the last 100 years the book is not one I use primarily for identification. Instead its description of the flower is lyrical in a way that a field guide is not. For example of the baby blue eyes, one of my favorites it is said

When skies are smiling and the earth is already clothed with a luxuriant and tender herbage, we find upon some balmy morning that the baby-eyes have opened in gentle surprise upon the lovely world. The spring breezes blow over no more beautiful and ethereal flower than these.

The entry goes on with the author's personal encounter with baby-blue eyes folding the description of the flower into her story. What a beautiful way to write about flowers. The best way to learn is to enjoy what you're studying and Mary Elizabeth's Parsons book is a joy to read. I'm glad I opened the book rather than just letting it collect dust on my shelf, it's a wonderful discovery of a world of black and white.