The Flora of Elephant Rocks: Finale

This is the last post regarding my trip to Elephant Rocks! It was a good time of year to go, and I learned a lot about the local flora (and fauna! see below).

This is the second turtle we saw. There was a third, but he was too far away to photograph. This one's cute as can be. He was showing off his lovely shell. He's even got his head thrown to the side in a glamorous pose. This guy's a future Ralph Lauren model, I'm telling you.

Now back to plants. At the edge of the quarry were these cattails (Typha latifolia), which are neither common nor unheard of in my area. These plants had cottony fluff on their tips. I think the fluff is the fruit of the plant, which has bristles to aid in dispersal.

Kind of different, isn't it? Dandelions and cotton use the same device to propagate their species.

After taking those pictures, we ventured away from the quarry and back onto a trail. There I found a plant that looked very familiar:

It looks like a shamrock (though there is no consensus on what species "shamrock" actually refers to)! While I cannot find any photographic evidence, this plant must be within the Oxalis genus (which also includes purple shamrock and woodsorrel). This picture gives a glimpse of the hot-pink undersides of the leaves.

Looking back, I can't determine whether or not these flowers are coming up from these Oxalis plants. They're pretty, though.

Yeah, still can't tell. I don't see any other leaves around them, so maybe these two have the same roots (pun?).

Here's a final "shamrock" hanging out with another woodsorrel species to the right.

I hope you've enjoyed seeing my trip to Elephant Rocks! What species comes to your mind when you think about shamrocks? Are cattails common in your area? What about turtles?

Next post: the brightest pink of the season thus far.