I never saw the flowers even though I make it a point of hiking through this area regularly. Due to the chewed off tops, it is quite possible if I had visited a few days or a week later I may not have seen these plants either. bboy - not sure if you are referring to the plant's odd name or if you think they were eaten by horses, but on that note, while I was looking up info about "horse gentain" it was noted that nobody really knows why it was given this name :-)

Those are beautiful pictures, Randy! When I saw your pictures, the plant reminded me of a native plant that grows on my property in the bottom of the hollow where it's wet. Most of the plants have bloomed out, but I found one still in bloom - I had forgotten the name of the plant, so I looked it up, and it's pluchea foetida/stinking camphorweed. I've never seen any butterflies use the flowers, but then I don't go to the bottom of the hollow that often. The picture of pluchea purpurescens/salt marsh fleabane in my wildflower book looks just like your pretty pink flowers - I'm sure that's what yours is. Sherry

I, too, am a planted native of Western WA. Throughout my childhood and youth, I foraged for berries all over Western WA. Now, in my own garden, although the majority of my plants are non-native, I have a lot of native plants interspersed here and there, that have volunteered and that I have nurtured, including both red and evergreen huckleberry and oregon grape, trilliums, etc. I have had all the berry plants growing in everything from complete shade to lots of sun. From my berry picking days, to my own plants, I can tell you that, even though they will grow in the shaded understory of the forest, the plants that produce the most berries, by far, are the ones that get more sun, and the more the better. This holds true for the flowering currents. As a berry picker, you always try to find a good thicket at the edge of the woods, with an eastern exposure. They really like several hours of morning sun. Sun exposure between 2 and 4 pm can kill young plants, but once established they can take that as well, if watered properly. I have a volunteer evergreen huckleberry growing out of a log in my back yard, in full sun, that is happy as can be. It gets enough water, because it's near a hardy fuchsia. A caution on fireweed (if that is what it really is). I have lived in Alaska, also, where it could almost be the state flower. It is a root runner and can be quite invasive, especially here in WA, where it doesn't get the winter cold to keep it in check. Salal, also a native, is also a root runner, but it is very hard to get established, if not growing there naturally. I have known people, whose yards are backed by a large forested area, that absolutely hate it. Regarding soil....all our native plants do like a highly organic, slightly acid soil. I have extremely light, sandy soil, which dries out very fast in the summer. My success with the natives has come from giving them a good, deep mulch of medium shredded bark, with fines in it. In the years I don't mulch I can really tell they are not happy. Good luck!

Google "asparagus fern".