Spring blooms showing at Nodding Trillium
Creeping phlox. Dan Pittillo photo
It’s barely March, but an abnormally warm winter means several spring flowers are already blooming.
At the Nodding Trillium Garden in Cullowhee, botanist Dan Pittillo reports that skunk cabbage bloomed in early January, and in February seersucker sedge, liverwort, variable-leaf heartleaf, Walter’s violet, creeping phlox, wild geranium and hairy buttercup followed suit. As of March 1, Oconee bells are blooming too among others.
The Nodding Trillium Garden is a 20-acre property at 601 Cane Creek in Cullowhee featuring about a mile of trail through a rich alkaline cove with 34 rare plant species in addition to a tremendous diversity of more common plants. The property is open to the public sunrise to sunset year-round, with off-trail walking and picking flowers prohibited.
