Early blooming coltsfoot (Tussilaga farfara) makes an appearance in Sun Valley. © BCP 2011
After my nature walk earlier this week in Taylor Creek Park — in which we did not find a single flower blooming, (with the exception of some lovely snowdrops that had escaped from a long-gone garden) even though we are well into April — I was determined to find something blooming (aside from the silver maples, that is) somewhere.
I decided to head to Sun Valley, a wild and woolly tract of land owned by the TRCA that is nestled between the Don Valley Parkway and south Leaside. (To see where Sun Valley is, click here for an aerial view courtesy of Google maps.) I reasoned that while Taylor Creek is a narrow ravine with steep, wooded hillsides, the ambient temperature would likely be a few degrees colder than the flattish bottom lands of the Don Valley. There, I thought, the sunshine (if ever we got some) could more easily reach the soil and warm it up enough to get some plants going.
Seems my theory was right.
I had to search hard, but I finally found a few little yellow flowers in bloom. They are coltsfoot (Tussilago farfara), a low-growing, early blooming plant in the aster family. They get their unusual name from their leaves, which strangely don’t appear until after the flowers have bloomed. Apparently the leaves look like the foot of a colt in cross section.
The flowers of coltsfoot look a bit like dandelions (Taraxacum officinale), but the plants are quite different botanically.
Tomorrow I’ll post a photo of the red-tailed hawk that was hunting for mice? voles? smaller birds? over the enormous Sun Valley field as I hunted for my blossoms.
© BCP 2011
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