Viper's Bugloss

This spectacular non-native but common Ozark wildflower also called Blueweed (Echium vulgare) is typically found in "disturbed ground" and gravel bars. On a Huzzah River gravel bar almost a whole field of these grew three feet tall, their flowers inhabited by bees and butterflies. It looked like a city of apartment buildings with tenants flying from room to room. The seed supposedly looks like a viper's head. (A simile is like a metaphor.) Handling this plant might give you a rash.

Blue Sage

Blue Sage, salvia azurea, belongs to the mint family and also, says the wonderful Ozark Wildflowers manual by Don Kurz, belongs to the western third of the Ozarks, but this is the eastern third and I am so glad it's here, in a meadow that had a path mown into it that allowed convenient closeness for a photo. Wild Blue Sage's hooded flowers -- like the flowers of the "tame" garden sage -- are loved by bumblebees.

Love Medicine

Meet the Great Blue Lobelia (Lobelia siphilitica). It is an autumn flower, uncommon but of course we have it here, growing over a small stream (see photo of its environment below right; the lobelia likes "seepy areas"). The wildflower ID book I rely on reveals its old-time uses:

"The Mesquakies used great blue lobelia in love medicines. The roots were finely chopped and mixed into the food of a quarrelsome couple without their knowledge. This, they believed, would avert divorce and make the couple love each other again. Other tribes used root tea for syphilis..."

The book: Kurz, Don. Ozark Wildflowers: a Field Guide to Common Ozark Wildflowers. Helena, MT: Falcon, 1999. ISBN 1-56044-730-3.

A Wealth of Blue Wildflowers

Love blue flowers, most people do, and on one walk in July in rugged rural Missouri I saw seven kinds of blue wildflowers. Have no idea how they will show up on your screen, but the three-petaled ones above right, with hairy centers, are Broadleafed Spiderwort; the three-petaled dewy one with the green bug inside is a Hairy Wild Petunia; the spectacular flowery stalk at left is the American Bellflower, which likes shade and water; the blue explosion bottom is a Downy Skullcap (Scutellaria incana), mint family; and the other small photos are of Mist Flower, Dayflower (the lone flower with the asphalt in the background) and chicory (you knew that.) Clicking on the photo enlarges it.