An Independence Day tradition: counting the blooms — red, white and blue
Gregory C. Staple
Marble
Editor’s note: This piece is adapted from the author’s field guide:
“Get Out There Crystal River Valley Wildflowers” (2024)
Each July 4 — along with attending Redstone’s folksy parade and barbecue — I celebrate our country by doing a bio blitz, counting every floral species I can find in my back meadow or on a trail. Early summer blooms typically make it a grand day to be a naturalist.
What better way to honor our nation’s values and its remarkable botanical heritage?
I also make time to reread some of Donald C. Peattie’s enduring reflections, written at the outset of World War II, on what citizen scientists might contribute to the cause of liberty on the home front. An excerpt appears below.
A naturalist “is by profession a defender of just such human values as men die for [because] science is as precious to the cause of liberty as the manuscript of the Constitution, and more so; only by the ethics and intellect of free scientists can it be held aloft … Nature is an ultimate sanctuary for sanity and goodness: American nature is the first national principle.
