Ten-Petal Blazing Star

A carpet of Ten-Petal Blazing Star flowers paints a foreground below Mount Helena in Western Montana. This beautiful native wildflower flourishes in some of the toughest scruffiest and least lush places in the state. Its giant showy flowers are visible in the month of August and open about an hour before sunset and closes around midnight. Pollinators such as bees and moths absolutely flock to this plant for its sweet nectar. Some are successful, while some only find themselves trapped in this plants’ sandpaper like hairs and stiff barbs on its stems. It’s not well known why the plant has insectivore instincts, but one hypothesis is that the decaying corpse of these unfortunate critters eventually fall to the ground and fertilize the soil for the plant’s benefit.