Nodding blooms point upward and away from the pointed red and yellow flower center, resembling a shooting star. Leafless stalks rise over the foliage. A spring bloomer and prairie ephemeral, shooting star goes completely dormant in summer. A woodland native best grown in a lightly shaded area.
Bees are the chief pollinators of shooting star, the pollen must be extracted from a narrow tube formed by the united stamens. The bees accomplish this by vibrating their bodies against the tube to shake the pollen out, a technique known as ‘buzz pollination.’