Amelia Heath, 4, of Plymouth (pointing) asks about Virginia bluebells at Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden in Theodore Wirth Park in Minneapolis. (Piioneer Press: Jean Pieri)

I was excited to learn about plants while exploring what is billed as the oldest wildflower garden in the United States. But as we walked through the rustic gates of the Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden, it was clear the appeal for my boys lay in the thickly mulched trails.

"Mama, can you please not stop us and say, 'Look at this flower?' "said my 9-year-old as he and his younger brother took off running. I walked slowly behind, admiring purple Trillium and Jack in the Pulpit in the dappled shade of the woods.

I wish I knew how Eloise Butler got her students interested in flowers. She was a botany teacher in the Minneapolis public schools and the founder of this 15-acre garden, tucked into Theodore Wirth Park on the western edge of Minneapolis. In 1907, she and several other teachers petitioned the Minneapolis park system to set aside this area as a preserve for wild species.

"A particular reason for selecting this place was the undrained tamarack swamp, such a swamp being the abode of most of our orchids and insectivorous plants so interesting in habit and structure," she wrote in 1926. "Indeed, most lovers of wild plants are bog-trotters and find in the depths of a swamp an earthly paradise."

By all accounts, she was devoted to her passion. She hunted plants on her holidays, continued coursework in botany at Harvard University and the University of Minnesota and, upon retiring from teaching, was appointed the garden's curator. The garden was renamed after

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her in 1929, and she died four years later while working in the garden at age 81.

I stopped first at a small visitor's center, where an entire display is devoted to delicate drawings of the flowers that are currently blooming in the garden. There is also a guide you can purchase ($5) or borrow (if you leave a driver's license). The guide follows numbered stations through the garden and describes some of the 500 species of plants there.

But my boys had no interest in such a thorough

A preschooler touches a Virginia waterleaf in the garden. The naturalist leading the group encouraged children to touch but not pick the wildflowers. (Pioneer Press: Jean Pieri)
investigation. They consulted the postcard-sized map and started to explore the trails that looped back on each other in figure eights. I could barely keep up with them.

We visited in mid-May, and the woodland flowers were in bloom. I saw patches of delicate Virginia bluebells and yellow trout lilies, named for the wide mottled leaves that someone thought resembled the coloring and perhaps the shape of a trout.

I'm not an avid gardener or a naturalist, and I have a hard time matching drawings of flowers in books to the real thing. So, I was delighted to find many flowers labeled. Meanwhile, my boys were more interested in the blue heron flying overhead and a woodchuck lumbering up a slope just yards off the trail.

The garden is popular with bird-watchers, and we saw a half dozen middle-aged couples with binoculars sitting on benches or strolling quietly along the trails. I winced when my boys ran ahead of them and broke the hushed silence and birdcalls with shouting. The garden discourages running, but I had a hard time enforcing the rule.

We walked uphill to an open prairie, where I sat on a bench under an oak tree and watched the blond heads of my sons bob above the tall dry stands of Indian grass. Later in the summer, this section of the garden will bloom with aster, goldenrod, coneflower, blazing stars and other prairie flowers.

I enjoyed our walk in the woods. I even bought one of the guides, and when I brought it home, I discovered, to my delight,

Adeline Clements, 2, of Golden Valley listens to a naturalist talk about poison ivy and its effects. (Pioneer Press: Jean Pieri)
I have a cluster of wild ginger in my back yard, along with Canada violets and Solomon's Seal.

The boys had a great time, too. But I don't think any botany rubbed off on them. Next time, I might try one of the free tours. I think the boys would have been more interested in looking at plants if someone other than their mother had been pointing them out.

Maja Beckstrom can be reached at 651-228-5295.

THE SCOOP

What: Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden

Where: Theodore Wirth Park, Minneapolis

Information: 612-370-4903 or minneapolisparks.org

Hours: 7:30 a.m. to half-hour before sunset April through mid-October; shelter open 10 a.m. to one hour before sunset Monday through Saturday

Cost: Free

Target audience: Anyone who likes a walk in the woods

Crowd pleaser: The showy lady's-slipper (Minnesota's state flower) blooms in June.

Avoid: Parking hassles. Bring quarters for meter parking in the lot.

Tip: Pick up a scavenger hunt or flower guide at the visitor's center.

Special events: Free tours with a naturalist are offered throughout the week. There's a nature walk from 1 to 2 p.m. June 6, a garden sensory walk for kids from 1 to 2 p.m. June 13 and a special Father's Day walk from 1 to 2 p.m. June 21. Registration requested.