Fireweed blooming in mid-late September after other plants have gone to seed.
Observation by Erica Lujan:
This one fireweed plant is still blooming after all the others have gone to seed! I heard there have not been any temperatures below freezing, but this still seemed late. In a post about a late-blooming rose, Elia Epchook made the comment that the amount of vegetation per square foot keeps a lot of warm air. This blooming plant looks to be pretty tightly packed in. I wonder if, as temperatures rise and some vegetation becomes more abundant, late bloomers will become more common and be a positive thing for pollinators.
Comments from LEO Editors:
This observation has been added to the Late Bloomers Project. This project is tracking late buds and blooms on plants across Alaska, with particular attention to woody plants, to understand the impact that warming temperatures have on boreal plant life cycles.