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Wildflowers By Lauren Melink, Producer | Outdoor Idaho

Passion is an admirable trait. Whether it’s passion for mushroom hunting or trail running, gardening or motorbiking, there’s something exceptional about a person who cares an incomprehensible amount about a specific subject matter. It’s inspiring and energizing and as I’ve found while producing my latest Outdoor Idaho show “Wildflowers,” it’s downright contagious.

Indian paintbrush by Jay Krajic

Along with learning the names of about two dozen plants, this production has inspired me to appreciate nature around me in a new way — a slower way. A way that is entirely unlike the high intensity activities I’ve identified myself with over the years. Initially, I was hesitant to walk at such a snail’s pace, but in order to track down a tiny wildflower called the “turkey pea,” a slow-mo approach to travel is required. And so I dawdled. Head down, hands clutched together behind my back, step, pause, step, pause. For me, trails and trees have been a place for speed and breathlessness, hitting mileage goals and topping peaks via running shoe or bicycle tire. Never have I walked a trail to just… look around.

Arrowleaf Balsmroot by Kelsey Webster

And yet, this plodding and surveying and identifying wildflowers awoke in me an excitement for learning, a renewed interested in remembering and noticing that is reminiscent of elementary school. Within a few weeks of starting work on this documentary, I used the word “Lomatium” in a sentence. Like a real-life botanists. For those of you who haven't spent weeks reading up on wildflowers, Lomatium is the scientific name for biscuitroot, a wildflower that grows in Boise’s foothills and one I can proudly identify from a distance.

Biscuitroot

A few weeks after that, I purchased a plant identification book. And a few weeks after that, I spent my trail run pointing out plants like a true know-it-all. “Aase’s onion, bitterbrush, arrowleaf balsamroot, pinweed, milkvetch, golden current, turkey pea, phlox, dandelion!”

Phlox by Jay Krajic

This line of work is interesting because we are tasked with becoming quasi-experts in every subject we tackle. In only a few years, I’ve become the office authority in potato production, hunting, trail cameras, snow-making, moose population, geese defecation, dark sky reserves, urban wildlife, mountain lions, trail maintenance, no-till farming and now… wildflowers. It’s a job wherein curiosity is not simply allowed, it’s required.

In this case, when months are spent following around plant bloggers and botanists and wildflower seed farmers and wildflower photographers and ethnobotanists, it’s impossible not be moved by their enthusiasm. It’s impossible not to want what they have — a childlike giddiness in nature that’s enviable because of it’s suggestion of innocence. And what I’ve gleaned from this project is that passion begets play and play begets happiness.

The lesson in all of this is two-fold. Take time to appreciate the tiny things. Flowering weeds, creeping ivy, a pinky nail sized blossom. And get curious. Find a thing to be passionate about that echos the passion of the folks who spend time among the flowers.

Wildflower meadow in Idaho by Tim Tower

“Wildflowers” debuts June 16, 2022 on Idaho Public Television. The documentary will showcase dazzling Idaho wildflowers and the people who are passionate about them.

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