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FLORA OF MOUNT RAINIER NATIONAL PARK. 



grows abundantly hero, with its long slender stalk, bearing a white 

 cotton-like tuft on the summit. Sometimes this plant seems to 

 take complete control of small areas, but more often grows mixed 

 with other plants. The rosy spiraea, Spiraea densiflora, is a well- 

 known little shrub bearing dense clusters of small red flowers on 

 numerous short slender stems. In similar situations in the Olympic 



Fig. 1G. — Purple aster (Euccphalus Icdophyllus) . 



Color of flower, pinkish purple: height of plant, 1 to 2 feet; blooms July to September. 

 Photograph by Asahel Curl is. 



Mountains the Douglas spiraea of the lowlands grows with the 

 above, but this combination has not been seen here. Salix, com- 

 mutata, the common alpine willow, grows abundantly in these low 

 meadows and bogs, and is in bloom about the 1st of July. There 

 are few plants in bloom on the mountain before that time, uidess 

 the season should be unusually early. Le ptarrliena, Saxifraga, 

 Mitella, and Erytlironium are some of the other genera composing 



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