The Metropolitan Field Guide

In honor of Be Nice to Nettles Week in the U.K., here is a poster highlighting the benefits of Stinging Nettles. I plan to make more of these posters in the future. For more information about this plant, see Wildlife Plant:: Stinging Nettle.

Stinging Nettle (Urtica dioica) may be considered a painful weed by most, but it is a complicated plant with many hidden virtues ranging from a valuable wildlife plant to making beer.  While most people are well aware of the evils of Stinging Nettle, not many are familiar with the good. The complexities of the Stinging Nettle [...]

This is an excerpt from my latest post at the Native Plants & Wildlife Gardens blog. Click the link below to visit the full post. Finding native plants can be hard work. Here in Seattle, there are a handful of nurseries which carry a few odd native plants. There are native plant nurseries, but nearly [...]

One of the first plants I placed in my new yard this past fall was the Indian Plum. The reason it received this honor was because it is the earliest plants to bloom in the spring. Walk through parks or natural areas in the Pacific Northwest as early as February and you’ll see white flowers [...]

This is an excerpt from my latest post at the Native Plants & Wildlife Gardens blog. Click the link below to visit the full post. Here in Seattle we had a very long and very dry summer. It seemed that fall would never arrive as we enjoyed 70 degree days into October. However, the seasons [...]

This is an excerpt from my latest post at the Native Plants & Wildlife Gardens blog. Click the link below to visit the full post. I confess, I’ve never been very good with plants. This despite having a fair grasp on their workings; having taken horticulture and plant classes while getting my Landscape Architecture degree. [...]

Plants of the Pacific Northest Coast: Washington, Oregon, British Columbia & Alaska features nearly 800 plants common to the coast of the Pacific Northwest and is one of my most often referenced plant books. Boasting over 1,000 each photos and drawings, plants are described in good detail including information about plant structure such as leaf shape [...]

You would never know that Common Foxglove (Digitalis purpurea) is not a native plant of North America considering how abundant it is in certain regions like the Pacific Northwest. This flower was introduced from Europe and is found in gardens, and has naturalized to spread to roadsides, fields, forest edges and other disturbed sites around the [...]

On Being Misunderstood is a new feature at The Metropolitan Field Guide which will look at the variety of flora and fauna we live with which are too commonly misunderstood. From plants to wildlife, many of our daily interactions with these species are often negative or confused. Many of these reactions are based on misinformation. [...]

While you may not always associate succulents with cool, temperate climates, the Pacific Northwest has several native sedums which live and thrive in exactly those conditions. The Broad-leaved stonecrop (Sedum spathulifolium) is one of those succulents which grows only on the West Coast from British Columbia to California. It can be found at low elevations [...]

The pink, heart-shaped flowers of this plant define the pacific bleeding heart (Dicentra formosa). While the flowers are not as showy as some of the popular ornamental varieties, the plant as a whole is still beautiful and offers great benefits to a variety of wildlife. Growing 8-18″ high, the plant is a perennial which dies [...]

Dense thickets of Salmonberry (Rubus spectabilis) are a common sight to anyone hiking through the Pacific Northwest. It’s often found alongside creeks or in ravines growing up to 12 feet tall. Salmonberry can be found along the Pacific Coast from Alaska down to the Santa Cruz Mountains, most commonly along the coastal ranges. It grows [...]