Roadside Flowers Add Spice to Travel

            Fall represents the most picturesque time to travel Montgomery County’s highways and byways.  The forest canopy is now on the verge of exploding with the vibrant colors of oak, poplar, hickory and other hardwood trees.  The grasses in fields and pastures are vividly green thanks to all the nurturing rains received throughout the summer.  Highway, power and train rights-of-way also provide some beautiful colors that lend a pleasant addition to any car ride.  Unfortunately, when traveling 55 miles per hour down the highway these colors often merge into a continuous line of color.  Next time you notice these flowers see if you can identify any of the following:

            Tickseed beggar-ticks (Bidens aristosa).  Chances are if you’ve noticed any roadside flowers in the past few weeks it would have been these bright yellow jewels.  The tickseed is often mistaken for a sunflower because of its brightness and plant structure.  The bushes often grow in sunny areas and can reach heights of 3-4 feet.  In ideal conditions a large number of these bushes will grow together and produce a sea of yellow.  Perhaps what these bushes are best known for are the beggar-ticks.  The tickseed produces a seed that is highly conducive to attaching itself to pant legs.  These pods are shaped similar to a capital A and often must be individuals pulled loose.

            Sunflowers (Helianthus spp.).  Many species of sunflowers are located along roadside rights-of-way. These areas provide lots of sunlight and limited competition from large trees.  The sunflowers typically provide a bright yellow bloom.  The variety of species allows for plants that bloom throughout the spring, summer and fall.  Certain species of sunflowers are also considered to be rare.  For these plants, roadside areas are often their last opportunity for survival.

            Goldenrod (Solidago spp.).  Goldenrod is similar to the sunflower in that there are multiple species that bloom throughout the year.  In North Carolina, 42 different species of goldenrod are known.  Given its name you can probably picture this plant in your head.  The body of the plant is deep green with multiple stalks coming off the main stem.  At the ends of these stalks is a beautiful, golden yellow color.  It reminds one of when fireworks explode overhead and leave a line of brilliant colors.  The golden ends of this plant are so eye-catching you rarely even see the underlying stems. 

            Grasses.  Three additional grasses add to the color and shape of the landscape.  Bent-awn Plumegrass (Saccharum contortum), Indian Grass (Sorghastrum nutans) and Purple-top (Tridens flavus) enhance many roadsides with their bushy tops.  Plumegrass can reach heights of 4-5 feet and puts off a wheat-looking top.  The top color falls somewhere between a deep yellow and light brown.  Indian grass also grows tall with a similar structure on its top.  The color is more of a greenish-yellow with dark black seeds giving it a look as though ants were crawling all over it.  The stalk of this grass can also reach a golden color.  Purple-top is almost self-explanatory.  A shorter grass, its most identifiable feature is the purple seeds located at the top of the stalk.  Purple-top is not as eye-catching as the other plants listed, but when growing in an entire field it can offer quite a beautiful scene. 

            The next time you’re in your car and have an extra minute find a safe spot to pull over and enjoy some of these flowers and grasses.  Trust me, they are much more enjoyable close up than in a 55 mile per hour blur.  *Thanks to Pete Diamond at the N.C. Zoo for his assistance.