Location Taken: Gros Morne National Park, Newfoundland
Time Taken: July 2012
I think this lovely flower is a harebell, aka a Scottish bluebell. Or at least the flower itself looks exactly like a harebell flower. The leaves and the white fluff don’t really match the pictures I’ve seen. For one thing, all the pictures show a much darker green foliage.
Admittedly, there’s plenty of reasons for this flower to be abnormal.
For one thing, it’s very windy where this flower was growing. One thing you can’t see in this photo was the three people trying their best to block the wind enough for the flower to stay still enough for a photograph. That amount of wind can easily change the dynamics of a plant.
For another, and one you can see, it’s a very rocky environment. There’s not much holding onto the plant, and even less holding onto the water. It’s possible this is actually two plants that just happen to grow in the exact same spot because they both act as windblocks for each other and that there’s easier access to water here. They do look like the same plant in the pictures I have, but then, harebells have very skinny leaves that could easily blend in.
And, for the last reason, the rocks themselves are abnormal. This is right next to an outcropping of mantle rock (I’ve mentioned it before). This rock is full of peridotite, which is full of nickel, which is awful for plant growth. And while this is not on the mantle outcropping itself, it is quite thoroughly in the place where all the rocks falling off the side end up. So all the plants making a living here have a rough time, but at least there is enough other material for them to grow on without getting a fatal dose of nickel poisoning before they have a chance to flower.
Heck, it’s even possible that this is a specialized version of the species, evolved to handle the extra nickel so it can take advantage of the edge land few other plants can handle. That happens a lot in places like this, where there’s an unusual geologic condition. Even something as simple as an island being a little too far from the mainland can create truly alien species.
All in all, those flowers really do look like harebell, so I shall continue to consider it a harebell.
