Marauding bands of warriors are sweeping through the forests at China Camp State Park. Screaming red, arms raised high, and three inches tall. Indian warriors, one of my favorite wildflowers, have begun to bloom in vermillion carpets at this San Rafael parkland--and elsewhere throughout Marin. I saw uncountable "warriors" poking up when the trail looped through their favored habitat, underneath the smooth tan trunks and spreading branches of native madrone and smaller, rust-trunked manzanita, which has distinctive peeling bark. I came home to read more about Indian warriors, and was faced with the harsh reality that this personal favorite of mine is as welcome as a tick.
My grim discovery began with my seeing inordinate numbers of this wildflower always growing in the same place: under madrones and manzanitas. I got all excited when I discovered the Cal Academy of Sciences California Wildflower ID tool--you can just click on a button and it gives you a bunch of possible wildflowers--but alas I just ended up with the equivalent of "does not compute," even when I put in descriptors (frilly red flowers, dark feathery leaves), and the Latin name (Pedicularis densiflora). So I did a little more poking around and cobbled together the facts that those feathery flowers are really just leaves pumped full of red chlorophyll, and the plant grows where it does because it actually latches onto root systems of members of the heath family--you got it, manzanita and madrone--and takes what it wants. Kinda like sticking your straw in somebody else's milkshake. Or having him pay for gas and filling up your car. I still like the plant even if it doesn't sound socially respectable.
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