Blow-wives: The 120th Flower of Spring & Summer!

Why is this flower called a "Blow-wives"? I looked for quite a while, but never did find the reasoning behind the name, but it certainly makes my husband laugh! :D (However, I did find out that it's called "Blow-wives" in singular or plural)

Aside from their peculiar name, these flowers are extremely cool, and believe it or not, the image above is NOT the flower! It's the seed head! Although I missed the blossoms, I got pictures last year which are shown below. When these flowers go into seed stage, they create seed heads that look like shimmering snowflakes cut from fish scales! Incredibly beautiful, they have a metallic sheen to them which seems unreal!

Blow-wives are native to the Pacific Northwest, and are found from southern Oregon to Baja, California. This unique flower is the only species in its genus, but is in the world-wide family of the aster, which has over 20,000 species. Blow-wives are very common in their habitat and may become an invasive weed, due to thier long-traveling airborne seeds and easy establishment in any terrain.

If you would like to know more about this flower, Wiki has a small source here: Wiki: Blow-wives (Achyrachaena)