At the end of June I drove up the Pennask Lake Road over the Quilchena Plateau and hiked a 13.6 km loop route around a ridge on the south side of Hamilton Mountain. Most of the route was through open grasslands, past a series of ponds and small lakes. The area is part of the Hamilton Corrals Commonage, with public access permitted through upper grasslands routes. The 4.25 hour hike was a wildflower corridor. Many of the taller summer weedy species were now flowering. The grass was still green, but tall and many of the lesser-used tracks were grown over. The weather was fine and there were a few mosquitoes, but it was mostly quiet. Along the way I spotted hawks, a turkey vulture, grasslands birds, ducks, geese, many butterflies and moths, pollinators, and a variety of insects. There were no cattle on the Commonage slopes, but there were signs of bears, coyotes, and deer.
I took a number of photos along the way, mostly of the newly emerging species and a few “stars.” The earlier blooming flowers were mostly past and now in fruit-development.
Shared here are brown-eyed Susan (Gaillardia aristata), shaggy fleabane (Erigeron pumilis), field locoweed (Oxytropis campestris), narrow-leaved mountain trumpet (Collomia linearis), hillside arnica (Arnica fulgens), long-stalked starwort (Stellaria longipes), pale agoseris with visitors (Agoseris glauca), pearly everlasting (Anaphalis margaritacea), fritillary butterfly (Argynnis callippe), silverweed (Potentilla anserina), meadow hawkweed (Pilosella caepitosa), and American brooklime (Veronica americana).
Click an image for a lightbox view and a caption/ID.
Also shared here are meadow milkvetch (Astralagus diversifolius), gaillardia, tall cinquefoil (Drymocallis arguta), sticky geranium (Geranium viscosissimum), silky lupine (Lupinus sericeus), alumroot (Heuchera cylindrica), old man’s whiskers (Geum triflorum), many-flowered stickseed (Hackelia floribunda), slender cinquefoil (Potentilla gracilis), red clover (Trifolium pratense).
As an added feature, a few landscape images of this beautiful grasslands area are also shared:
