Coastal Species

A slender, fast-growing annual grass for quick soil cover. Almost true to its name, three week fescue can grow from seed to maturity very quickly!...

A tenacious, architecturally beautiful, and under-appreciated plant with numerous uses. Found almost nationwide, path rush takes is named for its r...

Sometimes called “goose tongue” for the long, slender leaves, this saline tolerant native plantain naturally appears along ocean coastlines virtual...

Oregon checkermallow, belongs to the margins—the slightly damp edges – the prairie draws where a trace of water flows below the surrounding wild gr...

Defiant and otherworldly. Crimson and silver. This western thistle is a plant of some certain magnificence. And, it most certainly is not a weed. ...

The essence of coastal vegetation, American dunegrass (called sea lyme in old speak), is a circumpolar perennial grass, occurring both across the N...

Subtle, and low-growing, Spanish clover isn’t a wildflower that gets a lot of attention, but this mounding annual legume is an under-acknowledged b...

Beach pea is a quite glorious sprawling perennial adapted to coastal sand and gravel substrates. It emerges clambering from driftwood strewn shores...

Named for enormous underground tubers that can grow to the size of an adult human, this exceptional native cucumber relative is a perennial vine. ...

Yes, it looks like a dandelion, but, no, it isn’t a dandelion. Larger (up to almost 2-feet tall!), and quite ridiculously popular with many flower ...

The most vibrant population of Menzies’ larkspur we’ve ever encountered was in a low, sandy coastal back dune, a stone’s throw from a small acrid-s...

Kamchatka lily is one of the more enigmatic wildflowers of the northern Pacific coast – a plant of foggy mornings, damp coastal grounds, bears, anc...

A sprawling green and golden ground cover. That might be the best way to describe this shorter, clumping relative of taller, more upright gumweed s...

Emerging in spring, the nodding white cups of this incomparable California wildflower are completely enigmatic. White fairy lantern is a woodland s...

Bog saxifrage is a pleasingly odd kind of plant. One that we used to glance upon occasionally, with its almost succulent rosette leaves and floweri...

Rising from wet soils along the edges of ponds, vernal pools, and slow streams, this most delicate plant threads the water’s surface with fine, gre...

Our native western (and Great Lakes region) hawthorn is a tree of exceptional uses!  While the small black fruit is edible (in haw jelly, etc.), ...

Found in coastal dune settings across the northern Pacific (from the Russian far east to Oregon), big head sedge is an excitingly odd graminoid. Ye...