How strange; the weather has been unusually warm this winter, but this bloom is delayed. Perhaps it is inhibited by the long and cool nights.
There are thousands of them, these weird motionless caterpillar like ‘things’, in big herds under all the cottonwood trees. They make a squishy mess in the rain, and stain concrete. They may not look like much from a distance, and are merely ignored as a minor nuisance that must be swept from pavement, but on closer inspection, they really look unworldly, like something from another planet, or a bad Japanese science fiction movie.
They are just male catkins of the native cottonwoods. At least I believe they are. If there are female flowers mixed in, I would not know it. Nor would I know if they really are from another planet. I know that the cottonwoods will later make quite a mess with their cottony fluff that carries their seed away on the wind, so they must do what it takes to generate seed, which generally involves flowers of both…
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