Late April is a good time to see our wildflower flora coming back to life after a long winter. You can spot individual species coming up before the rush of May and June when hundreds of species are blooming. In and around the red maple swamp at the end of my street in Schenectady County I have seen blooming coltsfoot, Tussilago farfara, hummock sedge, Carex stricta, skunk cabbage, and Symplocarpus foetidus. There are also the ever-present winter leaves of garlic mustard, Alliaria petiolata. – Steve Young