Tag Archives: slink pod

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It's our earliest wildflower, the one with the unlovely common  names, Slink Pod and Fetid Adder's Tongue, Scoliopus bigelovii.  I recently found one blooming in our forest. You can see its leaves are just peeking up at the base of the stem.

This is what we look like trying to find one of these tiny wildflowers. This photo was taken by C'Anna Bergman-Hill a few years ago, the very same place I found them last week.

Craig Tooley took this close-up photo, which is in our book, Mendonoma Sightings Throughout the Year. Yes, it's a MUCH better photo than mine! The leaves of this member of the Lily family are distinctively mottled. If you find the leaves, which can grow to 12 inches long, you know where to look for the earlier-blooming flower next winter.

Thanks to C'Anna and Craig for allowing me to share their photos with you here.

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Many of our native wildflowers are quite small so you need to pay close attention when hiking in forests or on bluffs. Here are a few that are currently blooming.

Milkmaids, Cardamine californica, a member of the mustard family.

Milkmaids by Amy Ruegg

And Hooker's Fairybells, Disporum hookeri, a member of the lily family. The flowers shyly hid underneath this plant's leaves.

Fairy Bells by Amy Ruegg

Slink Pod, aka Fetid Adder's Tongue, Scoliopus bigelovii, also a member of the lily family.

Fetid Adder's Tongue, the first wildflower of the year, by Craig Tooley

All of these and more are blooming now, though the Slink Pod bloom may be over. I will share more of our coastal wildflowers soon.

The first two photos were taken by Amy Ruegg and the last was taken by Craig Tooley. I thank them for allowing me to share their photos with you here. To see much more of Craig's nature photography, here is his website: www.ruffimage.com