Purple Cushion Daisy (Erigeron poliospermus) (Photo by D. Grant Haynes)A solitary stroll on this very quiet Sunday of the Memorial Day weekend did not see this striving photographer and chronicler of the natural world in Lincoln County Washington encounter anything as spectacular as my bitterroot find a couple of days ago. (See Bitterroot extravaganza at: http://strigidae-bitterroot.blogspot.com/.)
What I found today were clumps of purple cushion daisies scattered about in an old farm roadbed. They are newcomers in the spring pageant of wildflowers that I seek to record here. While small (the photo is actually about 125 percent of the size of the flowers), and unspectacular, they too have their niche in the natural world that is Eastern Washington. Many small flying insects seemed happy to find the neat little white daisies blooming today.
I accept whatever blessings of beauty, innocence, and guileless goodness I encounter on my walks. Today, in addition to the purple cushion daisies, I saw a pair of ring-necked pheasants that are, no doubt, nesting nearby.
"Day by day the manna fell...", went the refrain from a religious hymn of my childhood. Purple cushion daisies and wild pheasants were rewards enough for me today.
D. Grant Haynes
