Spirea, 秀钱菊 My mom's sharp eyes spotted them and commented: we have this one in our front yard as well! Initially I dismissed and never thought it would be, util iNaturalist identified it.
white pasqueflower, towhead, after flowing finishes, hairy round head is like a towhead. heliotropic, always pointing their flower to the sun to increase the temperature.
Avanlance Lily, the reason they got this name is because they starts to flower when the snow is about to melt. Delicate pedals. Saw a lot more during creek, shady area.
Ocean Spray, I have seen this quite a lot recently in Purisima Creek preserve in bay area but on the way entering the Mt rainier, saw some growing on the river banks heavily. At a not so high elevation spot.
Green false hellebore, large wavy leaves, toxic for livestock, ranchers do not like them.I am pretty sure in the high elevation mt area in California, I have seen them a lot a well. usually along the creek.
lousewort, 马先蒿 partially parasitic. pediuclaris, multiple species in the area. flower confuse me as pea family but seems not. TODO: need to understand more.
hoary marmonts, true hibernator. Something I learned recently. By true hibernator we mean that aniamls would drastically reduce their metabolism to a level such as heart beat rate to 5 bpm and never wake up. Bears on the other hand is not true hibernator: they could even be waken up to give birth to babies! marmonts and pika are.
Loudy insects when flying, this is not the picture I took. But it's a bug that you can't ignore when hiking in sunny and dry area, especially at a bit higher elevation. They produce loud snapping sound when flying. The flying is not very smooth, bug size is large. AI gave a few answers, and I am not sure. Do you know?
Fireweed 柳兰, amazing Chinese name and I immedilately get the idea: leaves are alike willow, and flowers are similar to orchid. But probably not related to any of them. Very common in the broader area.
