Field of White

Two things that remind me of August are Golden Rod and Queen Anne's Lace.  Both are blooming now.  This little field is right down the street from my house and is loaded with Queen Anne's Lace.  Sometimes called Wild Carrot, this flower presses very well, which I've done almost every year.  Queen Anne’s lace is said to have been named after Queen Anne of England, who was an expert lace maker. Legend has it that when pricked with a needle, a single drop of blood fell from her finger onto the lace, leaving the dark purple floret found in the flower’s center. The name wild carrot derived from the plant’s past history of use as a substitute for carrots. The fruit of this plant is spiky and curls inward, reminiscent of a bird’s nest, which is another of its common names.  It looks a bit like poison Hemlock so one needs to know the difference before picking.  The most obvious difference is the stem, hemlock has a smooth one while Wild Carrot has a fuzzy stem.  It can be invasive in a garden too so I prefer to pick mine in its wild state.