Spring Wildflowers in Ottawa and Allegan Counties 2014

This post will be several adventures combined.  I hope to give you an idea what is blooming in West Michigan, places in Ottawa County and Allegan County.

Riverside Park at Max Lake

         Bloodroot

                      Bloodroot

 Along the trail at Riverside Park in Ottawa County, Michigan
Then a stop at Connor Bayou, another Ottawa County park.

 Connor Bayou on a rainy evening.

 Along the Grand River at Connor Bayou Park, Hepatica was blooming but it was closed up due to the cloudiness.

A trip to Minnie Skwarek Nature Preserve in Spring Lake Township revealed no wildflowers blooming except for Skunk Cabbage.

Then the next day Marie and I went to Allegan County, Silver Creek County Park, and Happy Boots Corner.  Silver Creek County Park, (3900 - 134th Ave., Hamilton, MI)   is primarily an equestrian park and has both day use facilities and a primitive campground. Silver Creek is 320 acres in size and connects to over 25 miles of horseback riding trails. There are 75 campsites in the park, 65 of which are available for horse camping. Silver Creek also has 450 feet of frontage on Silver Creek, which is a spring fed trout stream. You will also find picnic tables and grills available in the day use area. The most beautiful and unique thing about Silver Creek is that the entire park is primarily wooded, providing for plenty of shade in the hot summer months and some spectacular foliage color in the fall. In keeping with the primitive setting, there are no modern restrooms or running water, but there are hand pumps and vault toilets. Silver Creek Park is open year round and has some spectacular fall and winter camping available.
We went here to see if the Trailing Arbutus was blooming. 

      Trailing Arbutus

     Trailing Arbutus

 Silver Creek in Allegan County

Along the road to Happy Boots Corner, we saw a fair amount of snow in the ditches, this was April 22, this is late in the spring to still find snow here.

 Happy Boots.  No, you won't find that name on a map.  We named this place.  There were several plants blooming here.

                                        Spring Beauty

 Spring Beauty

 Spring beauty, some are almost white, these were shouting pink!

 And we found more Golden Saxifrage!  This time I put a quarter by it to compare for size.  The flower is tiny.

 This is a photo of our bench, which we rested upon and listened to frogs!

 We saw Marsh Marigold blooming!

 Skunk Cabbage
We enjoyed Happy Boots for a few hours, then moved on to another special place with warm, sunny, south facing hills to see Trout Lily, the white variety.

                   Squirrel Corn

And one Large-flowered Trillium that was really blooming.  When we got back to my house I checked on my very own Round-lobed Hepatica.  It was blooming too.

It was a fun day with great weather.  The wildflowers are coming along just fine, if a bit slow.