Another Roadside Attraction- The Queens of Autumn
This entry was posted on 10 Oct 2006, 6:56 AM and is filed under Another Roadside Attraction.
Though springtime in Texas is celebrated far and wide, autumn in central Texas offers some spectacular sites which may go unnoticed by most. I've lived in the Midwest and the Rockies but until I moved the Texas Hill Country I had never seen the sight of native prairie grasses in full efflorescence.
Efflorescence is the "bloom" of and ornamental grass. We all recognize the plume of the pampas grass but the sight that woke me up to the beauty of the native grasses was a stand of Big muhly along the creek at Doeskin Ranch. Doeskin is part of the Balcones Canyonlands National Wildlife Refuge and offers nature walks every fall during National Refuge Week.
Several years back while on a hike I came around a bend and there ahead was a stand of five foot high clumps of Lindheimer or Big muhly. Gorgeous!
You can see these grasses every day if you travel Lakeline Bivd. in Cedar Park. They're the big grasses in the median. Another beautiful native grass is Indian grass. These grasses like slightly damper conditions and you can spot their large golden seed heads on the southwest corner of 1431 and Lakeline.
Further down Lakeline at Cypress Creek another awesome sight is the Maiden grass in full bloom in front of the Exxon station.
As the summer sight of the ubiquitous Crape myrtles fades away, take some time to look around for these "Queens of Autumn".
