Here are some things that can help you use this site most effectively. If all else fails, give it a read.
The Valley: For purposes of this site, the Valley is anywhere folks in Wydaho might go for a walk or hike. There’s the valley floor, of course, which is mostly fen or other wetlands. But then there’s also all the mountains surrounding us. The further I go afield, the larger the Valley gets, but within reason (whatever that means). However, none of the flowers here is restricted to the Valley. Indeed, many are found throughout the continent. So if you aren’t lucky enough to live in the Valley, give the site a go anyhow.
Photography: Foremost, this site is for people who aren’t into serious botanizing as well as for those who are. I’d expect you to take pictures with your cell phone, but the more the better… at least if your companions, kids or dogs will let you. More data always helps.
Identifying flowers: As with most flower books, you can browse the herbarium from the Species Gallery page. Alternately, on the left side of the Gallery pages, there are a bunch of check boxes. You can limit what you are shown by checking these. The performance of this feature on phones or tablets is iffy, however. Alternately, at the bottom of any page (or on the mobile menu), there is a set of “adjectives”. I have tried to include as many different descriptors as possible. Check as many as you wish, then hit “show selected” at the bottom. Alternately, if you have a name in mind, or an adjective, or a phrase, type it into the search box at the top right. It might show you what you want, or at least a smaller collection of choices. Personally, I like this method best of any. Alternately, if you just want to look at a particular species, type it into the search box, or use the A-Z Index. If I have missed an adjective or keyword, let me know and I’ll probably add it. The more of that stuff on the pages, the more likely a non-botanist will figure out what they are seeing.
The Species Gallery: There are a lot of fine flowers in the Valley. Click on any one from the Gallery and get more details. The presentations come with a mouse-over zoom. Click any of the small thumbnail photos and it becomes the main photo. Click the biggest photo and you access a slide-show. On mobile devices, you can swipe whatever photo shows up and see the whole gallery, sequentially.
Colors: My mother taught me my colors and there are those who say she got them wrong. In customizing your search, when you think “color”, also think “-ish”. And, some “white” flowers, might show up when you search for red ones. That is because many of the species have a lot of variation in flower color. So it goes.
Sizes: Clearly, flowers vary in size, even on the same plant. Therefore, here, I have classified flowers as teeny, small, normal, large, and really big. These make sense on some intuitive scale. Unfortunately, sometimes a single flower may be teeny, but the whole inflorescence could be really big, especially on composites and umbellifers. I have used “blossom size” as a way around this… it can be either the flower or the inflorescence.
Some botanical terms: There are some things that just don’t work unless you use a botanical term. First among these is flowers. Sometimes, it’s clear, like a columbine or a blue flax. But some flowers come in bunches, like the monument plant or lupin. These structures are inflorescences. When you look at a monument plant, you would say it has a normal size flower, but a really big inflorescence. Both sizes are listed for each plant. There are also different kinds of inflorescences. The words for these are confusing and often of little help.
On the other hand, some “flowers” are not flowers at all. For the Asteraceae, for example, our “flower” (or blossom) is actually an inflorescence. Or, with the Indian paintbrushes, the bright red bits we call a flower are actually modified leaves, i.e. bracts with an actual flower in their axils (arm pits). And you probably can’t really see any of that in a cell phone photo. So for a start and for plain language purposes, roll with this and it should become clear pretty soon. Where I do use actual botanical terms, the underline means that if you poke there, a definition will appear.
Thanks for reading this. Have fun.
