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“Sand lilies!”
“Yellow violets!”
“Cushion buckwheat!”
Niel and Molly were taking turns calling out the names of wildflowers as we walked into the heart of Devil’s Garden.
“Yellow paintbrush!”
“Pussypaws!”
“Oregon sunshine!”
I’m a blooming idiot when it comes to knowing the names of flowers. There are some I know — poppies, roses and a few others — including one I called out before Neil or Molly did. “Larkspur!”
We were hiking in Devil’s Garden, which this late spring is popping with an explosion of flowers. Throughout our hours of wandering, my friend Niel Barrett, and my daughter, Molly Juillerat, were excitedly findings dozens of varieties of big and small bloomers.
Niel was using a copy of the book “Common Plants of the Upper Klamath Basin,” published in 2007 by the Native Plant Society of Oregon’s Klamath Basin Chapter, on his cellphone to help with verifying his findings. Molly, one of the book’s co-authors, was carrying and referencing a print version.
Along with excellent color photos of hundreds of flowers, shrubs and trees, “Common Plants” provides information on characteristics, habitat and other information. Funding for the book, which is free but over the years has become increasingly hard to find, came from Klamath County Commissioners. For experts or novices, the book is illuminating and informative.
Sand lilies, one of the Garden’s signature flowers, are described in detail: “With its grasslike leaves, this species often goes unnoticed until it begins flowering in the spring.” And with conditions being ideal, sand lilies currently are very noticeable.
During our wanderings, we weaved through the Garden’s ragged volcanic landscape, finding and identifying more and more varieties of flowers — upward of 50. But Devil’s Garden is more than a flower-filled landscape. It’s geologically intriguing: the remains of a hydroclastic volcano created when magma contacted water, creating an explosion that eventually solidified into a landscape of dunes and wonderfully weirdly, otherworldly formations.
To reach Devil’s Garden from Klamath Falls, take Highway 140 east past Dairy to the Yonna Valley Store, a distance of 17 miles. Turn left (north) onto Bliss Road. Approximately 12 miles up Bliss Road and past The Switchback Trailhead for the OC&E trail, turn left onto Forest Service Road 22. Follow Road 22 for 1.25 miles to a dirt road. Park there and walk to the Devil’s Garden area. Do not drive vehicles onto the fragile geological area. It’s also possible to walk to the area from the Switchback Trailhead, but that requires going cross country through woodsy, brushy terrain.
On other Garden visits, the focus has been on its devilish geology, but with Molly, Niel and Liane Venzke, this visit literally focused on flowers.
And flowers there were. My incomplete list includes sulphur and rock buckwheat, American bistort, death camus, dwarf monkeyflower, bitterbrush, arrowleaf balsamroot, rosy pussytoe, yellow desert daisy, arnica, thread-leafed daisy Phacelia, dusty maiden, wooly butterweed, daggerpod, common cryptantha, patches of almost past their prime onions, the remnants of shooting stars that Niel said were brightly colored a week earlier.
“Common Plants” also offers informational tidbits. The fascinating cushion buckwheat with their pompomlike flowers typically are colored white to pink but, as the book explains, the ones we found were yellow, a color found near and in Lake County.
Bitterroot, among the more plentiful varieties, also are known as Lewisia rediviva, named for Meriweather Lewis, the American explorer who with William Clark traveled the American West in the early 1800s. During their travels, Lewis collected the plants in the Bitterroot Mountains of Montana. Lewis also figures in the naming of the delicate blue-eyed Mary, having collected a specimen along the Columbia River in April 1806.
Lewis and Clark never visited the Garden, but anytime of the year, especially when its flowers spring to life, Devil’s Garden is a delight to explore.
Klamath Basin Outdoor Group will visit Devil’s Garden on Saturday. People interested in participating should meet at the Ledge at 9 a.m. to carpool to the Switchback Picnic Area (OC&E Trail).
According to trip organizer Gary Vequist, “The one-mile walk into Devil’s Garden will be slow and easy on an old road to the ash-covered slopes of Devil’s Garden. We will carefully walk about on the bare volcanic ground to view and photograph the patches of desert flowers. Note: May showers have brought June flowers surpassing the wildflower blooms of previous years. This is a leisurely trek of about two miles with frequent stops.” For information, contact Vequist at garyvq@gmail.com
Reach freelance writer Lee Juillerat at 337lee337@charter.net or 541-880-4139.
© 2022 Mail Tribune
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