the dragon! (lower) Greeter Falls in Savage Gulf State Park, TN. 🌼🐉✨
Drgn Goes Hiking 🌼🐉✨
by @rykela.bsky.social
Pictures from when I go hiking, wildflower hunting, gem mining, or take other excursions out into nature. 💖
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These Vasey's Trilliums seen along the Little River Gorge Road in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park were on the massive end for their species. That means they're probably pretty old! They were blooming unusually late, too... 🌼🐉✨
the dragon! I drove over an hour to find these orchids but I was a few days too late and the flowers were all droopy and wilting... Large whorled pogonia, Isotria verticillata, near May Prairie Natural Area. sigh. 🌼🐉✨
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The baby!!! 🌼🐉✨
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Was walking along a trail in NW Nashville this morning and noticed these two Yellow-Flowered Horse Gentians (Triosteum angustifolium var. angustifolium) in bloom. What a great, lucky blind-find! 🌼🐉✨
the dragon! Lanceleaf Trillium (Trillium lancifolium) blooming next to Spring Blue-Eyed Mary (Collinsia verna) near Lookout Mountain in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Both are fairly rare in the state. I went to Chattanooga in the hopes of seeing this trillium, and I'm glad I found some! 🌼🐉✨
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There's a conservation area northeast of Nashville that's one of the last remaining mesic forests in the central basin. I went there briefly today and was lucky enough to see a disjunct population of the rare Ozark Trillium (Trillium pusillum var. ozarkanum). They're ridiculously teeny tiny! 🌼🐉✨
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Prairie Onion (I think?) beginning to bloom in a cedar glade on 8/13/25. They were popular with the pollinators. 🌼🐉✨
the dragon! It's been four months since I last did one of these. My big move and new job took a whole lot out of me! These are Tennessee Purple Coneflowers - caught them in a cedar glade towards the tail end of their bloom season on 8/13/25 earlier this year. 🌼🐉✨
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They bloom in the Appalachian mountains at the same time as the larger, far more common Downy Rattlesnake Plantain -late July/early August - and although they share much of the same habitat (usually sheltered under rhododendron) they're far more sensitive. Here are the ones I saw last week! 🌼🐉✨
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This is Pinebarrens Death-Camas, an endangered flower found in less than half a dozen rocky, exposed sites worldwide - primarily at Dolly Sods Wilderness and here near Grandfather Mountain. It seems to be a very good year for them! They were far more abundant here than I have seen previously. 🌼🐉✨
the dragon! Southern Bush Honeysuckle growing abundantly at a Blue Ridge Parkway overlook just north of Graveyard Fields. This is looking north down into the East Fork Pigeon River gorge as it heads downstream towards where Skinny Dip Falls used to be before Tropical Storm Fred destroyed it in 2021. 🌼🐉✨
the dragon! A bumblebee working hard among American Cranberry flowers at a high-elevation seep on Black Balsam Knob near the Blue Ridge Parkway. Lots of buzzy wiggles~! These are the cranberries that were cultivated into the produce we all know about, but the plant itself is very rare here in the state. 🌼🐉✨
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A Round-Leaved Sundew nestled among stag's-horn clubmoss and sphagnum moss on the Ivestor Gap Trail. It seems to have been enjoying a snack! 🌼🐉✨
the dragon! Spent yesterday running around the Great Balsams and saying goodbye to a lot of these familiar places before I move. It was bittersweet yet the flowers were as wonderful as always. The many seeps along the Ivestor Gap trail are lovely! Here is a little Sundew plant waving hello from the moss. 🌼🐉✨
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While doordashing today, I encountered this most excellent fluffy boy hanging out next to the Taco Bell front door. If I had a nickel for every giant silk moth I've seen at a fast food place, I would have two nickels... 🌼🐉✨
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Went back to this spot today to confirm my specific waterleaf ID using the color of the flowers. I was right! 💖 Broad-leaf Waterleaf. 🌼🐉✨
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Saw some of this woodland pinkroot myself growing along a wet roadside ditch in upstate South Carolina recently, just outside of Caesar's Head State Park. The flowers are honestly stunning when seen close up! 🌼🐉✨
the dragon! A close-up of our native Bluebead Lily growing along the Summit Trail in Elk Knob State Park at approximately 5000' above sea level. The only patch I saw in bloom, though there might be more around there that just didn't have any flowers out yet - they're a higher-elevation plant here. 🌼🐉✨
the dragon! Where the trail begins to enter a stand of red elderberry trees in Elk Knob State Park, NC, about 5000' above sea level. 🌼🐉✨
the dragon! A little katydid exploring the tip of a stalk of Fairy Wand (Chamaelirium luteum) flowers, seen in Caldwell Co., NC. Not really a pollinator, probably, but a cute little visitor nonetheless. 🌼🐉✨
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One of my favorite driveby wildflowering spots in April is a particular little-used gravel road in Watauga County, NC. As it zigs and zags along, there are a number of rock cuts that happen to face due north - and over the decades they've turned into seeps covered in uncommon, gorgeous flowers. 🌼🐉✨
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I love the appearance of foamflowers when they're just starting to bloom. The buds are a rich pink then lighten to white as the flowers open so when you find one before it's at peak bloom there's a lovely, subtle color gradient going from the bottom to the top. My photo doesn't do it justice. 🌼🐉✨
the dragon! This little West Virginia White butterfly stayed very still and let me take a picture of it on a flower. Turns out the Two-Leaved Toothwort abundant at this site is one of its preferred host plants. I was saddened to learn that they are extremely threatened by invasive plant spread, though... 🌼🐉✨
the dragon! I'm going to call this trillium Rocky. This is the second year in a row it's bloomed out of this crack in the rock, but this time around it was oriented to face outward so I could actually take a good picture lmao 🌼🐉✨
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On my way up to hang out with friends, I stopped at my nearby spot again and the Southern Nodding Wakerobin were out and blooming! The actual flowers weren't as numerous as last year or the year before, but it's strangely reassuring that they continue to bloom even with everything going on... 🌼🐉✨
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I led some friends on a hike around a small lake today. Not much was out yet (the flowers seem delayed this year), but there was a small cascade where a creek emptied into the lale that had some little dusky salamanders crawling on the rocks! I counted four in total, two I took good pics of. 🌼🐉✨
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As you can tell from the cocoon I posted recently, it's the time of year for moths to start coming out. Shoutout to this absolutely gorgeous supermodel of a Luna Moth I saw two years ago, most likely fresh out of his own cocoon. Moths like these are like giant, living plushies! 4/13/23 🌼🐉✨
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drove by the wildfire at table rock state park today while going to look at flowers and waterfalls with a friend. 🌼🐉✨
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Took a friend to look at the trout lilies and he noticed this empty cocoon left behind by a Polyphemus Moth. These giant silk moths weave their cocoons out of silk then wrap them in the leaves of a nearby food plant. Not sure what species these leaves are from, but it was such a neat find! 🌼🐉✨