Not much happening in the way of flowers here in January, but I saw lots of plants starting to wake up. Still a few hold over Camphor Weed blooming and I saw some early blooming Pepper Grass. One interesting little plant I saw stating to grow is Salicornia bigelovii.



Here's some photos of more mature plants I took a couple of years ago.

This photo reminds me of an aerial view of a forest. These are still young plants.


Here are older blooming age plants.



Close-up for scale.


The little white things sticking out in this picture, are the anthers.

Very interesting, Jay. Does the plant bloom?

SongofJoy said:Very interesting, Jay. Does the plant bloom?

Yes, that's what the last picture shows.

Ah ha!

That is a very interesting plant, I guess it grows close to salt water?
http://plants.usda.gov/core/pr...

Yes it does. These are growing on an island, in Sabine Lake, which is salt.

We would probably call it a samphire here. Is it edible?

They look similar, but in a different family. It is edible.

http://www.eattheweeds.com/sal...

The USDA map does not show it growing in my location. Phooey on that. I enjoy foraging for edibles.

Samphire is becoming quite widely eaten in Europe and includes your genus apparently. You see it a lot on the chef programs now.

We have probably purloined the name for similar looking Australian plants.

Here is how to prepare it:

http://www.4cooks.com.au/ingre...

Looks very good. A little added to a recipe would no doubt give the dish a salty tang. I suppose it will become popular here in time. Hope so.