Native wildflower

This is lovely - whatever it is.

Agree with Bernieh

I wonder if it could be transplanted?
That might make a nice addition to my backyard!
The foliage almost looks "pine-like", but the flowers look a little "Lilly like"..
I may have to wander back out into the field and find it, then dig around it to see how large of a root structure it has. If the root ball is not very large, It would be a great candidate for a "dry-rooting" into by bird-bath garden or a suitable container for the back porch!
Wish me luck!

Good luck with your attempt!

We had another rainstorm today, but the forecast for the next few days is supposed to be dry and cool. The little plant is so unusual looking and is the only one of its' kind growing in the field. We'll see Sunday if the soil conditions in the field will be right for a transplant attempt.

I'll keep my fingers crossed for you - hopefully it will be a successful operation!

I will know tomorrow!
We have not had any rain in a few days and the trails that I cut through the Forrest to the field are drying out. Hopefully the root ball of that lovely plant is not very large and I can transplant it into a large container, so I can have better control of the soil activity that will sustain it. I sure hope this project works because it is such a beautiful specimen that I have never seen before.
~N2~

What happened next I am intrigued? Here in Scotland digging up and "rescuing "plants from the wild is frowned upon.

I decided to just amend the soil where the plant was growing with a full organic program, not try to transplant it, and it did really well until winter hit.. This year's winter killed it.. That's too bad. I wonder what it was.

I have been intriqued because it is similar to two plants I have in my garden. A californian poppy (escholtzia californica) and an evening primrose. I think it might be an evening primrose. I copied this from altnature.com - Evening Primrose is a North American native biennial plant. The plants are very tall, often 4 to 5 feet or more in height. The stem is erect, stout, soft-hairy, reddish and branching forming a shrub. Leaves are alternate, rough-hairy, lanceolate, about 3 to 6 inches long and lemon-scented. The taproot is elongated, fibrous, yellow on the outside and whitish within. The flower spikes grow on auxiliary branches all along the stalk. They are about 2-1/2 inched in diameter, bright yellow and have four petals, a cross shaped stigma and a refluxed calyx (leaves under petals). The flowers open in the evening and close up during the day and are strongly scented with a delicious sweet perfume which attracts pollinating moths. The fruit is an oblong 1 in. capsule containing many tiny reddish seeds. Does this sound anything like it.there is a photograph on that site. You describe your plant as 2 foot tall but that might be to do with the soil. If it set seed last year they would have self sown and the plant being a biennial would account for you not seeing the flowers this year, they will arrive next year in the plants second season.

By God, scotsgran, I believe that you might have nailed it!

It's beautiful hope u marked the spot as it might come back next yr. Looks like a wild plant but then again ALLLL plants are wild until someone cultivate them.
So who cares. If it's to ones liking them that's all that matters.
I know it's not a Calif. poppy.