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| Polygonum is a genus of plants primarily growing in temperate climates. |
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| The flowers are either pink, white, or green. |
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| The plants very from being annual to perennial, or herbaceous to woody. |
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| Several are aquatic plants growing in shallow water and some have floating leaves on the surface. |
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| Polygonums are mostly viewed as weedy, but not necessarily as invasive. In my humble opinion, they are beautiful and like seeing the around my house. |
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| Blue Monkey Flower is perennial wetland plant that is native to eastern North America. It likes to grow in sunny wet prairies and meadows, but also likes to grow in partially shaded floodplains and moist open woodlands. It is a very showy beautiful plant when all of the small blue flowers are blossoming together. |
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| Purple Coneflower is a perennial plant native to eastern North America. It likes to grow in mesic to moist soils anywhere where there is plenty of sunlight, since it cannot tolerate shade. It is uncommon in the wild, but it is popular in home gardens. A close relative, pale purple coneflower is the only plant that looks like it in its natural range. |
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| Sweet Coneflower or Sweet Black-Eyed Susan is a native perennial plant in North America. It is primarily found in mesic prairies, savannas, and opening in woodlands. You can distinguish this plant from the other Black Eyed Susans because the leaves have very soft hairs on them and have a fuzzy feel to them. They have very long lasting blooms lasting for a month to a month and a half in mid-late summer. |
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| Common chickory is a naturalized exotic species from Europe. It is often times seen along roadsides and in empty lots. The flower looks like bachelor's buttons, but the leaves are completely different. The leaves look very similar to dandelion leaves, which should be of no surprise since they are related. Chickory is also called blue dandelion. |
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| Culver's root is a perennial plant in the Snapdragon family (Scrophulariaceae) and is native to eastern North America. It likes to grow in mesic to wet prairies. |
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| Leadplant is a perennial plant native to central North America. It likes to grow in high quality mesic prairies and open woodlands. Some people consider it to be a small shrub or bush because as it matures, it turns woody. Leadplant is in the bean family (Fabaceae) indicated by the compound leaves. |
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| Liatris spicata is a showy perennial plant native to North America. It is typically shorter than Liatris pycnostachya and the flower spike is thinner than Liatris punctata. That is the way I have learned to separate the three similar species. Marsh blazing star is a very rare species and is hard to find in the wild. When uncommonly found, it likes to grow in high quality wet prairies and wet meadows, especially in sandy ones. When it is grown in the garden, it is tolerant of mesic conditions. |
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| Green Sunfish (Lepomis cyanellus) is a very common fish in the sunfish family (Centrarchidae) that resides in shallow rivers and lakes. It likes to eat aquatic insects and other small fish. |
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| Grass Pickerel (Esox americanus vermiculatus) is a fish in the pike family (Esocidae) that lives in shallow, eutrophic, highly vegetated, slow moving rivers and lakes. |
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| Wild Bergamot is an essential to any prairie, and it is ubiquitous in most mesic prairies that you find. It is a very important source of nectar for insects, and large patches will keep invasive species from penetrating. |
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| A relative of spotted bee balm, the flower looks totally different and is easy to identify. |
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| Spotted Bee Balm is a native short-lived perennial plant native to the eastern half of North American mesic prairies. This plant is in the Lamiaceae (mint) family and imparts a minty-oregano aroma when crushed. This plant attracts a wide range of insects to its flowers, but the pungent leaves themselves are rarely eaten by other animals. |
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| Rattlesnake master is a perennial plant native to the eastern half of North America. It likes to grow in high-quality mesic prairies. Rattlesnake master is a unique plant and there is no other plant that quite looks like it in its range. The reason why it is called rattlesnake master is because some Native Americans used to use it to treat rattlesnake bites. |
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| The flowers are arranged in apical umbels. |
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| White prairie clover has white flowers and short wide leaves. |
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| Purple prairie clover has purple-magenta flowers and thin long leaves. |
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| Michigan Lily is a showy perennial plant native to prairies in eastern United States and Canada. Habitats include moist prairies, open areas in floodplain forests, Bur Oak savannas, fens, swamps, and high quality prairies along railroads. The large showy orange-red flower looks to be designed specifically for hummingbirds, Sphinx moths, Hummingbird moths, long-tongued bee, and other butterflies and insects. It is unique in its appearance with an unbranched stem with leaves in whorls and a few showy flowers appearing in early-mid summer. The only plant that looks like the Michigan Lily is the Turk's Cap Lily, which is commonly mistaken for it. |
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| While on a field trip to Hennepin and Hopper Lakes, I stumbles across a beautiful Eastern Tiger Sawllowtail Butterfly in the prairie. |
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| Eastern Tiger Swallowtail Butterfly can be found in the eastern United States. It likes to feed on plants in the Apocynaceae (milkweeds and dogbanes), Asteraceae (asters, sunflowers, daisies, etc.), and Fabaceae (legumes) families. This Swallowtail is dimorphic; the males are black and yellow, the females are either: black, yellow and black, or yellow, black, and blue. |
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| Yellow flag is an exotic aquatic perennial plant native to Europe. It has escaped cultivation from home gardens and now poses a large problem in some areas in the United States. This is an easy plant to identify since there are no other plants that resemble its appearance. |
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| Prairie Phlox is a perennial plant native to the eastern half of the United States and Canada. It is a prairie spring-time bloomer that likes to grow in moist to mesic soils. |
