As we are wont to do in team Echinacea 2015, we started the day with a wonderful bout of phenology. The number of newly discovered plants is really starting to slow down but as we get closer to peak flowering, more and more will become apparent. Speaking of peak flowering, it seems to be almost that time of year for the Echinacea, some sites, like Landfill, are already seeing plenty of heads near the end of their flowering for the summer. Both p1 and p2, having been burned this year, are a little slower on the uptake but they’re starting to gain momentum.
A “done flowering” Echinacea leads the way for its flowering brethren.
Before lunch, Stuart took a group of us out and showed us the proper technique for painting the bracts to identify styles for hand-crosses. We made some paint holsters and feel ready for some compatibility assessment!
