Return to the Giant Eveningstar

Giant eveningstar flowers are exceptional.  For one thing, they prefer dry and open places.  They will grow, literally, in a pile of rocks where nothing else can catch hold of life.  The eveningstar also waits until now, during what is typically the parched heat of summer, to begin their bloom.  The leaves and stalks of these weedy-looking plants feel like Velcro to the touch and the flowers have a scent similar to that of a lily.  Perhaps, most uniquely, the flowers of the eveningstar do not open until the sun is setting.  They will remain open all night, allowing moths and other such nocturnal rovers to pollinate them.  They close with the rising sun.   

The open flowers are often as large as my fist.

By day, the closed eveningstar are easy to miss as we speed along in our demanding lives.  But at night, if you look at the raw earth and stone where highways and roads have been carved from our hills and mountains, you may find the giant eveningstar in all their glory.

    

Last evening, a boatload of us cruised along the lake at dusk in my pontoon boat specifically to return to a patch of giant eveningstar we had spotted earlier in the day.  Posted is a photograph of eveningstar flowers I captured with my smarter-than-me-phone.

--Mitchell Hegman