Field Guide

An annual, spring-blooming wildflower, Miami mist has loose coils of small blue flowers with distinctive, delicate fringes on the petal lobes.

Missouri has one introduced and four native wood sorrels. Violet wood sorrel is the only one that has magenta or lavender flowers.

Fire pink is a low, clump-forming perennial with many slender, spreading stems that are sticky from glandular hairs, with open clusters of bright red flowers. This showy native Missouri plant is growing in popularity among home gardeners.

Hedge parsley is an introduced plant that looks a lot like parsley. It was first collected in Missouri in 1909 and has become much more abundant in recent decades as it spreads along roadsides and railroads.

The petals of long-leaved bluets are not blue; they are white, often tinged with pink. Look for it in rocky, open Ozark woods, prairies, glades, and old fields in the southeastern half of the state. It prefers acid soils.

Mullein immigrated to America along with Europeans, and with them it has spread across the continent. Its fuzzy, green-gray rosettes of leaves and tall spikes of yellow flowers make it easy to identify.

Moth mullein is a native of Eurasia introduced to our continent in the early 1800s. Since then, it has spread across North America. It’s named because the fuzzy flower, with 2 antennalike stamens, looks something like a moth.

Rock pink is a succulent perennial with slender, naked flower stalks and bright magenta flowers that usually don't open until after noon. Leaves are basal and fleshy, to 2 inches long. Look for this plant in glades and other hot, dry, rocky places.

White anemone is a showy native wildflower with interesting, deeply toothed leaves. Often occurring in colonies, it spreads easily (even aggressively) from rhizomes and is sometimes cultivated in wildflower gardens.

Rue anemone is a common and beloved spring wildflower. It blooms March–June. It and other woodland wildflowers require a forest habitat to survive, so they depend on the oaks, hickories, maples, and other trees that surround them.