Orchid Hunting on Fidalgo and Whidbey Islands and in Larrabee State Park

I've made a number of trips recently to different sites on Whidbey and Fidalgo Islands and to Larrabee State Park on the mainland.  Fidalgo and Whidbey Islands lie close to the mainland and are accessible by car, unlike many of the other San Juan Islands.  State Highway 20 runs west across Fidalgo Island and then south across the Deception Pass bridge and down the length of Whidbey Island.  Larrabee State Park is south of Bellingham in the Chuckanut Mountains.  All these places are excellent locations for native orchids and for other wildflowers and I found plenty of both. 

The native orchids I found were:

Western Fairy Slippers

(including both pale forms and the all-white form)

Western Spotted Coralroots

(including the unspotted form)

Western Coralroots

(a very dark form just beginning to bloom)

Striped Coralroots
(the most beautiful of the Coralroots in our area)

Other wildflowers were:

Common Camas

Checker Lily

Spring Gold

Harsh Paintbrush

Naked Broomrape

White-top Clover

Leafy Mitrewort

Creeping Buttercup

 Menzies Larkspur

 Prairie Star

Skunk Cabbage

And, as is always the case, there were plenty of other things to photograph:

The Olympics, Whidbey Island and the Straits of San Juan from Goose Rock

Pileated Woodpecker photographed in Washington Park

Wildflower Meadows at Goose Rock

 

Madrone Trees in Bloom in Washington Park

Even a Waterdrop

Deception Pass Bridge