Gaillardia World: Welcome!

Greetings, everyone!  Welcome to Gaillardia World--at least the glimpses I had of it by "noticing" Gaillardia pulchella, aka "Blanket Flower," for several hours a day this past summer.   

Gaillardia pulchella, Bird Runner Wildlife Refuge, October 15, 2022

Some temporary ailments were keeping me from long hikes here at Bird Runner Wildlife Refuge (a native-prairie preserve in the Flint Hills of Kansas, where I live with my husband).   I opted to see what I could learn closer to home.  (In the 17 "Gaillardia World" entries that follow, I document the wild creatures that came to Gaillardia, while in a Substack essay, I muse about what I learned and what it might say about us humans and our relationship to nature.  That essay is at  https://margystewart.substack.com/p/at-home-in-the-land-welcome-to-gaillardia .) 

Patches of Gaillardia pulchella, a native annual, had sprung up nearby, thanks to my having thrown out some seeds left over from a prairie restoration.  "Paying attention" is a long-standing spiritual practice in various traditions.   I decided to "pay attention" to those patches--one in our front yard, one by the barn.  

  Here is the Gaillardia in our front yard in June:

The Gaillardia has grabbed some bare spots in an existing garden, 

planted over 50 years ago by the farm wife who lived here before me.  

The green above the limestone is some rock cress,
also planted a half-century ago by that 

same skillful gardener.

And here is Gaillardia by our barn in September:

Gaillardia by our barn, with volunteer Maximillian Sunflowers

and Gray-headed Coneflowers.  September 2022.

While some blooms are going to seed, forming

puffy white balls, others are just opening.  

Blanket Flower is native to  the Lower 48, but most common 

in hot, dry areas.    It is the state flower of Oklahoma.

The "a-r-d-i" in the middle of "Gaillardia" must stand for "hardy!"  Gaillardia bloomed month after month, through dry spells and rain, hot winds and early frosts.

But Gaillardia impressed me even more with the force-field around it, the dynamism of its interactions.   Gaillardia-world was alive with creatures flying, buzzing, crawling, feeding, dying,  hiding, searching, mating, resting, growing, and other activities that were part of their lives.

The posts that follow this one (under the heading "Gaillardia World") show glimpses of this co-flourishing--Blanket Flower's inter-being with butterflies, bees, flies, spiders, dragonflies, wasps, grasshoppers, moths, damselflies, and bugs.   For me, these "noticings" were openings to growth, as they allowed me to learn more about the many invertebrate species with whom I share the prairie world. 

I was an English major with no scientific background so my method of ecological learning may be of use to others.  This was my routine:    I would sit in a lawn chair near the Gaillardia and watch for shapes or movements on the blossoms, stems, and leaves.  I had my Samsung phone-camera in hand and an inexpensive  Sony on a tripod nearby, ready to record.      If I didn't recognize the subjects, I would send their photos to bugguide.net or  iNaturalist.org--both sites where experts generously help amateurs identify their finds.  Once the experts steered me in the right direction, I could delve into field guides and follow Google trails to learn more about these creatures' lifeways.  In addition, I could post questions to Kansas Arthropods, a Facebook group where experts also counsel amateurs.  

These conversations, albeit virtual, were deeply rewarding, as all participants shared the recognition that "noticing" something small can connect us with something large--indeed, the largest--Creation at work, alive in our world.  

The posts that follow are each named for a kind of creature, such as "Gaillardia World: Bee Flies" or "Gaillardia World: Moths"; or for a scenario, such as "Gaillardia World: A Doomed Love Affair" or "Gaillardia World: A Promising Love Affair."  

Every name I was able to put to Gaillardia's residents and visitors opened the door to more questions.   Similar explorations are available to anyone who pays attention to local  wildflowers.    It is thrilling to grow in knowledge while encountering the mysteries of the world.  As more spaces, tiny or huge, are devoted to native plants, exhilarating discoveries and humbling wonder become accessible to all.