My old man

Hymenoxis grandiflora, July 2, 2023

Indy-Mtn Boy ridge, 12,000’, August 23, 2023

Common & scientific name

Old man of the mountain, Hymenoxis grandiflora

Family

Sunflower, Asteraceae

Location

East summit, 12,100’

Fun, weird, helpful, or little known fact

This common alpine resident stands out with its comparatively huge flower heads and woolly-hairy stems and leaves. According to Dr. David Inouye, who for 4+ decades has studied alpine plants and their pollinators at the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory, just over the Elk Range in Gothic, H. grandiflora grows for 12-15 years without flowering, storing up nutrients in its roots and leaves, flowers once, and then dies. So treat every old man of the mountain you see in bloom with reverence, and imagine (if you can) your own last summer . . . .

Backside, August 23, 2023