Wildflower Weeek 2025 Archives - Kentucky Native Plant Society

Leading up to Wildflower Weekend 2025, at Carter Caves SRP, KNPS will be holding our 5th annual Botany Blitz 2025, which will run from Saturday, April 5th, through Sunday, April 13th. The spring Botany Blitz is a group effort to document as many plant species as possible within Kentucky during the week preceding Wildflower Weekend, and will again be hosted on the community science platform iNaturalist. Participants can use the iNaturalist mobile app in the field (or use the website if your preferred camera is not a smartphone!) to document their observations of Kentucky’s flora.

As in previous years, Botany Blitz 2025 will commence with a series of Kick Off Hikes held Saturday, April 5th and Sunday, April 6th, in parks and natural areas across the Commonwealth. These easygoing wildflower walks are led by local botanizers and naturalists who are familiar with the native flora that hikers will encounter. As the Kick Off Hikes are meant to start the Botany Blitz, we are hoping that folks who plan to participate will sign up for an iNaturalist account (if they don’t already have one) and join the Botany Blitz 2025 project, although you do not need to be an iNaturalist user to enjoy these hikes.

Call for Kick Off Hike leaders: Although we have several Kick Off Hikes in the planning process, we are seeking more hike locations and hike leaders! If you would like to lead a Kick Off Hike in your area, please fill out and submit the form below. All hike details are up to you, the hike leader, to choose, however we have a few suggestions to guide you:

Before selecting a hike location, we recommend that you visit the official website for that location or contact the owning agency/organization to check if there are any rules or guidance regarding larger groups of hikers.
Please also consider the amount of parking at the site, the typical weekend visitation levels during peak wildflower season, and the maximum number of participants you want to set. You may want to avoid choosing locations with limited parking that can fill up quickly on weekend days.
We also recommend arranging for a friend to co-lead the hike with you. A co-lead can assist you in keeping your the group together on the trail, watch the clock to help you stay on schedule (wildflower walks are notorious for running long!), and help guide any hikers that need to leave early back to the trailhead.

If you have any questions or if you need to change any hike details after you’ve submitted this form, please email us at KYPlants@knps.org.

If you are willing to lead a KNPS Botany Blitz Kick Off Hike on April 5th or 6th, 2025, please submit the following information.

Name(Required)

First Last

Email(Required)

Best Phone Number to Reach You(Required)

Hike Co-Leads

If you will have any co-leads for your hike, please list their names and email addresses here.

Name of Trail

If the trail is a named trail, please enter it here.

Name of park, preserve, or natural area(Required)

County(Required)

Name of Kentucky county where the hike will be.

Day of Hike(Required)

Chose the day of the hike.

Meeting Time(Required)

The time that folks should plan on meeting.

Time Zone(Required)

The time zone of the hike.

Estimated Hike Time Length (in hours)(Required)

Please provide your best estimate of how long the hike should take to the nearest half hour.

Approximate Distance of the Hike (in miles)(Required)

Please provide your best estimate of the distance of the hike to the nearest quarter mile.

Trailhead or Parking location (if parking is not right at the trailhead)(Required)

Please provide map coordinates of the trailhead location. If parking is not available at the trailhead, please provide the coordinates of the parking area.

Habitat(Required)

Please provide 1-2 sentences describing the habitat participants will see, highlighting any attractive, unique, or rare plants that may be blooming at that time.

Accessibility Information(Required)

Briefly mention any aspects of the trail that hikers should be aware of, such as steep slopes, significant stair climbs, slick trails, etc (see the “Accessibility Information” sections for the Mammoth Cave Cedar Sink Trail and Heritage Trail for examples)

URL where hikers can view a map of the facilities and trail (if available)

Maximum Number of Participants(Required)

Please choose according to your personal preference, as well as any rules the site may have regarding large groups. Some factors to consider are: if your hike is on a broad, level trail and you can project your voice well, you may be comfortable leading a larger group. If the trail is narrow and hikers will be single file, you may want to have a smaller number of hikers since this can affect how well folks at the back of the line can hear you.

Registration Options

After the Kick Off Hike schedule is finalized and published online, participants will be able to register for the hikes on the KNPS website. However, if you are affiliated with an agency or organization that would prefer participants register for your hike through your own registration page, please let us know

Are you currently an iNaturalist user and relatively familiar with the iNaturalist mobile app?(Required)

Yes

Would you be comfortable helping to review/confirm/suggest ID's for observations in the Botany Blitz 2025 project?

Yes

Phone

This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

If you are an artist or graphic designer, we would love for you to consider entering the Wildflower Weekend 2025 Logo Design Contest. This is an open design contest to come up with a logo for Wildflower Weekend 2025 (April 11-13 at Carter Caves SRP). The logo will be used on t-shirts, hoodies, and coffee cups, as well as on all publicity about the event. The submitted designs will be presented to the KNPS membership for voting and the winner will be awarded $200 and be recognized on the KNPS website.

In June of 2022, a KNPS member posted the image on the right on the KNPS Facebook group page of a t-shirt she had found in a thrift store. Asking among several longtime members, it turns out that in the 1990s, and into the early 2000’s, KNPS produced t-shirts for each Wildflower Weekend. The KNPS Board decided to bring back this great tradition for Wildflower Weekend 2023.

The Board asked KNPS vice-president Kendall MacDonald to design a logo for the 2023 Wildflower Weekend. The beautiful image she created featured the yellow trout lily (Erythronium americanum) with Cumberland Falls as the background. The image was used in all publicity for the event and was also featured on an adult t-shirt, a coffee mug, a kid’s t-shirt, and an adult hoodie that were available for sale in our KNPS Gear Shop.

For Wildflower Weekend 2024, the KNPS board decided to have a Wildflower Weekend 2024 Logo Design Contest. This was an open design contest to come up with a logo. We put out a call to artists and graphic designers who were members of the Kentucky Native Plant Society. We asked the designers to submit designs that incorporated either the great white trillium (Trillium grandiflorum) or the stinking Benjamin, a.k.a. red trillium (T. erectum) or both. These charismatic species are commonly found decorating the floors of the rich forests in the Natural Bridge/Red River Gorge area. We were thrilled when we received eleven gorgeous designs. The submitted designs were then presented to the KNPS membership for voting. After two rounds of voting, KNPS members selected the design created by Rick Mullenix.

**Three-parted yellow violet (Viola tripartita)**

Wildflower Weekend 2025 will be held at Carter Caves SRP in Carter County. The county is a hot spot of Viola diversity in Kentucky, with 13 species of Viola found in the county. One species of violet was selected to be the species around which the logo design will focus, the three-parted yellow violet (Viola tripartita). It is native to Eastern North America, being primarily found in the Southern Appalachian Mountains. The species is rare throughout its range, especially so in Kentucky where it has only been reported from Carter County.

V. tripartitia‘s preferred habitat is rich, mesic forests over calcareous rocks. It is a small perennial herb that has yellow flowers in the spring. It is distinguished from other yellow violets native to the area by having leaves that are wider than long and which have a cuneate base. The leaves are typically three-lobed though unlobed leaves are not uncommon and lobed and unlobed leaves can occur on the same plant.

The focus and star of the design must be Viola tripartita . If desired the artist can also include any (or all) of the other 12 species of violet found in Carter County. The artistic rendering must be botanically accurate and any stylized representations will be rejected.