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Archive for May, 2012

More Spring Wildflowers

Posted in General gardening, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 30, 2012| 13 Comments »

I think I could post something like this every day and still not be able to show all of the flowers that are blooming right now. Most of the flowers appearing in this post are old friends that I’ve known for years. White Clover (Trifolium repens) is blooming everywhere now and is very good for a lawn because it is a nitrogen fixing plant, meaning it converts atmospheric nitrogen into a soluble form that turf grasses and other plants can use. By doing this it acts as a free source of nitrogen. White clover also mows easily, stays quite short, and stays green throughout the season. It shouldn’t be used for high traffic areas though, because it can’t stand the abuse. I once gardened for some people whose lawn was about 90 percent white clover and it was beautiful. Red clover (Trifolium pretense) on the other hand, although it fixes nitrogen like white clover, grows too fast and too tall for a lawn. It also forms large, tough clumps that are hard to mow. It’s an excellent feed crop, so keep red clover in pastures and meadows. This is Vermont’s state flower. Nothing says June like the Oxeye daisy (Leucanthemum vulgare.) The trouble is, it’s still May, so these are about 2 weeks early. Though we have come to think of this plant as a native, it was actually introduced from Europe or Asia. The Shasta daisy that is so well known in gardens was developed by plant breeder Luther Burbank from introduced species like this one.

A close-up of an oxeye daisy. Dame’s rocket (Hesperis matronalis) is considered an invasive species and can be seen in fields and along roadsides in abundance.  It was so highly valued that it was brought over from England by the colonists in the 1600s. This plant forms clumps much like phlox and can get 5 feet tall under the right conditions. The flowers range from purple to white and are very fragrant, especially in the evening. The easiest ways to tell that this plant isn’t phlox is by the narrower, slightly toothed leaves and the fact that phlox has 5 petals and dame’s rocket has 4. This plant is in the mustard family. Bird’s foot trefoil (Lotus corniculatus) is a common plant seen on roadsides and parking lot edges, which is where I found this one. It is in the pea family and grows about a foot tall. It gets its common name from its clusters of brown, 1 inch long seed pods which someone thought looked like a bird’s foot. The plant has 3 leaflets much like clover. This plant was introduced from Europe as livestock feed but has escaped and is now considered invasive in many areas. It can form large mats that choke out natives. There are many different species of forget me nots (Myosotis.) Some are native and some were introduced and all have cross bred so there are many hybrids. There is a lot of confusion surrounding these plants, with some insisting they are native and some insisting they came from Europe. I try to stay out of all that and just enjoy their beautiful blue color. Bunchberry (Cornus canadensis) is blooming. I haven’t seen many of these this year, which is strange because they used to be very common. The Cornus part of the scientific name tells us that this plant is in the dogwood family, though just looking at it gives that away because it looks much like a dogwood blossom. Like a dogwood the flowers are the tiny greenish white clusters that make up the center disc. The large white “petals” are actually bracts. The common name “bunchberry” comes from its tight cluster of red berries. After trying to photograph speedwell flowers that were one step above microscopic I found the germander speedwell (Veronica chamaedrys,)  seemed gigantic in comparison because of its 3/16 to 1/4 inch flowers. It also called bird’s eye speedwell. This is another plant introduced from Europe and Asia. It has the strange habit of wilting almost as soon as it is picked, so it isn’t any good for floral arrangements. Like all the speedwells I’ve seen it has one lower petal smaller than the other three. Speedwell is very common in lawns. I was lucky enough to stumble onto a colony of 50 or 60 painted trilliums (Trillium undulatum) that were spread out along a roadside. These blossoms were fresh-not like the ones that had just about gone by that I posted before. This is, in my opinion, one of our most beautiful wildflowers. This native plant fools a lot of people because it looks so much like Solomon’s seal (Polygonatum commutatum.) It is actually false Solomon’s seal (Maianthemum racemosum,) and the best way to tell that is by the flower cluster at the end of the stem. True Solomon’s seal flowers dangle under the leaves all along the stem. If the plant isn’t flowering you can still tell the difference by the stem itself; on false Solomon’s seal it zig zags like what is seen in the photo and on true Solomon’s seal it grows very straight. Here is a photo of true Solomon’s seal (Polygonatum commutatum ) for comparison. Note the very different flowering habit between this plant and the false Solomon’s seal shown previously.  There are about 50 species of true Solomon’s seal so identification can be tricky at times. Yet another plant that mimics Solomon’s seal is Star Flowered Solomon’s Seal (Maianthemum stellatum,) so called because of the tiny star shaped blossoms that appear at the end of the stem. When compared to the true Solomon’s seal in the previous photo it is easy to see that the flowering habit is completely different. Again, the stem on this plant also zig zags, while the stem on true Solomon’s seal is straight. I haven’t been able to identify the insect that was working so hard on this blue bead lily (Clintonia borealis) flower, but I think it was a false blister beetle, which is a pollen eater.  This native plant is in the lily family. Its leaves resemble those of the lady’s slipper and it is sometimes mistaken for that plant or wild leeks. I found large colonies of it growing in a shady part of the forest where trillium and lady’s slippers grew. The yellowish green flowers will be followed by a shiny bright blue berry which is supposed to taste horrible. I’ve never seen a lupine (Lupinus) bloom in May but here they were, blooming happily on a river bank.  This plant is in the pea family and like white and red clover fixes atmospheric nitrogen into a soluble form that can be used by plants. It is said that the lupine has been cultivated for 2000 years or more, beginning in ancient Egypt, because the seed is so high in protein. These are beautiful plants to have in the garden but are very susceptible to aphid attack. Sweet Viburnum (Viburnum lentago) is also known as nannyberry. These native bushes are dotting the woods with their white, mounded flower clusters right now. Red twig dogwoods are also beginning to bloom, but they have four petals and the viburnum have five. Dogwood flower clusters also tend to be much flatter on top and seem to hover just above the branch. Sweet viburnum has a much more rounded flowering habit. These shrubs are also called wild raisin and nanny plum for their fruit, which is a small black drupe with one flat seed. Northern Blue Flag Iris (Iris versicolor) has suddenly popped up around the local pond. These native plants love water and near water is where I always find them. There is also a southern blue flag (Iris virginica.) The “flag” part of the name comes from the Middle English flagge, which means rush or reed. The roots of this plant are extremely toxic, so if you forage for cattail roots be sure the roots of blue flag aren’t mixed in with them.

Suddenly I realize

That if I stepped out of my body I would break

 Into blossom.~James Wright 

I hope you enjoyed this one. Thank you for stopping by.

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Forest Finds

Posted in Nature, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 26, 2012| 20 Comments »

There probably isn’t anyone who is sick of seeing flowers but absence, as they say, makes the heart grow fonder so I thought I’d show a few other things that I find interesting. If you ever need a boulder New Hampshire is the place to come and shop. This one is solid granite and is almost as big as a U.P.S. truck. What good are boulders, you ask?Well, smooth rock tripe (Umbilicaria mammulata) likes to grow on boulders. I found a large colony of it growing on one near here. I thought the recent rains would plump up lichens, which were looking pretty sad. I don’t think they look any plumper, but they feel much more pliable and alive. This group of Solomon’s seal was growing happily on a boulder. Leaves, pine needles and other forest litter fall on boulders and eventually all become soil. Boulders also absorb the sun’s heat and release it slowly. Many plants take advantage of this–I’ve seen many ferns as green in December as they would be in June, and they weren’t evergreen ferns. This fern does happen to be evergreen and is called the Christmas fern (Polystichum acrostichoides.) It will also grow in large colonies on boulders. Each leaflet bears tiny little barbs along its margins.Scouring rush (Equisetum hyemale affine) is more likely to be found growing near a stream or pond than on a boulder. These bamboo-like plants are in the horsetail family and can grow to be 4 feet tall. The stems of this plant contain silica granules and were used by pioneers to scrub pots. These are ancient plants that have been on earth for an estimated 280-380 million years. Much of the coal burned today comes from giant, tree size horsetails that lived in the past.One of the joints in a scouring rush stem. Each New hollow stem segment grows from the ring-like sheath of the segment below it. The rim of the sheath can be white, gray, black or brown but always ends in tiny black teeth, which are deciduous and can break off.This is the tip of a scouring rush stem.  This is where fertile stems will form colorful, spore bearing, cone shaped fruiting bodies. This plant also likes wet places and was growing very close to the scouring rushes. This is the royal fern (Osmunda spectabilis) just after it unfurled its fronds. I like its feathery look at this stage of its development; it looks very different than other ferns. This fern is the maidenhair fern (Adiantum pedatum,) which is so rare in this part of the state that I’ve only seen it once in the wild. A friend gave me this one and it grows in my yard. I think it is one of the most delicate and beautiful ferns. American larch trees (Larix laricina,) also known as tamarack, like to grow in wet, swampy places and seeds that fall on dry ground usually won’t germinate. That’s why when one is seen growing in someone’s yard like the one in the photo was it’s a fair bet that it was planted there. Larches are an unusual tree because, unlike most other conifers, they lose their needles in the fall. These trees are native to the U.S. and Canada. Tamarack was an important tree to Native Americans; some used branches and bark to make snow shoes and others used the bark from the roots to sew canoes. The Ojibwe people called the tree “muckigwatig,” meaning “swamp tree” and used parts of it to make medicine. Oak leaves aren’t only the last to fall, but also the last to unfurl. Even poplar and sumac are ahead of the oaks this year.  I like the fuzziness of fresh oak leaves.  Oak leaves also have a waxy coating that helps prevent moisture loss in dry times. This coating is also why fallen oak leaves are so dry when they are raked in the fall. I seem to be stumbling (literally) onto quite a lot of tree roots that look as if an artist had spent days carving, sanding and polishing them. I’m always happy to find one because I think they’re beautiful things. This feather wasn’t there when I went to bed but it was the next morning. It certainly is a good example of how birds stay dry in the rain. Sometimes nature makes a mistake and a plant will grow more leaves than it can support. This was probably why a maple tree shed this new leaf. It, along with the remnants of a single tiny blossom, spun slowly on the breeze in a spider’s web.

Birth, life and death – each took place on the hidden side of a leaf. ~ Toni Morrison  

I hope you didn’t miss the flowers too much. They’ll be back next post. Thanks for stopping by.

 

 

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From the Garden

Posted in General gardening, Nature, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 23, 2012| 18 Comments »

I thought I’d get out of the forest and back into the garden again for this post. Flowers are beautiful no matter where they grow, so you’ll find a little of everything from everywhere here.

Pheasant Eye Daffodil-also called Narcissus poeticus. This is supposed to have been one of the first daffodils cultivated in ancient times, and this is the latest and most fragrant one to flower here. I’ve seen more and more of these in fields and along roadsides so they are naturalizing. The yellow center cup with a red fringe and the late blooming period are good ways to identify this flower. Azaleas are blooming heavily this year, with bushes so full of flowers that you would think they would topple over under the sheer weight of it all. This deep pink one is in my yard and is a dwarf evergreen azalea. All azaleas are in the genus Rhododendron, and evergreen azaleas are in the subgenus Tsutsusi.This is a deciduous azalea that is much larger than the previous one shown and very fragrant. It grows in a local park. Deciduous azaleas are in the subgenus Pentanthera. I’m eagerly anticipating the native azaleas that will bloom soon. This deep purple Beaded Iris (Iris germanica) was in the same park and looked almost black. I don’t know the name of the cultivar. I’m sorry about the harsh lighting in some of these photos, but with a full time job and home renovations on-going, I just don’t have the luxury of waiting for an overcast day to take pictures.I thought this white bearded iris (Iris germanica) was especially beautiful.  Too much shade will cause weak blooming in bearded irises and these that I found in a park were being shaded by trees and shrubs. If they were moved to a sunnier spot they would do better. This is a Siberian iris (Iris sibirica) that blooms before all other irises in my gardens. This native to northern Asia and Europe is such a tough plant that I usually use an axe to divide it into smaller plants. Partial shade doesn’t bother this iris. In fact, nothing bothers this iris. This yellow daylily (Hemerocallis) is very early, blooming just after the Siberian irises bloom. This plant was given to me many years ago by a friend who has since passed on and I have divided it many times for family and friends. Two things make this plant special: the early bloom time and the heavenly fragrance that smells of citrus and spices. I have a feeling this is a Lemon daylily (Hemerocallis lilioasphodelus) which is a very old species brought to America in colonial days and originally from China and Europe.  The Greek Hemerocallis means “beautiful for a day,” and that’s how long each flower lasts. It’s a shame that many of today’s daylilies, bred for larger and more colorful flowers, have lost their ancient fragrance. Blue false indigo (Baptisia australis) is a beautiful plant in the pea family. This is a native plant that is sold in nurseries because it is so popular. Its flowers resemble those of the lupine, which is also in the pea family. Native Americans used this plant to make blue dye. True indigo (Indigofera) comes from the tropics.The pink flowers on this horse chestnut tree were really beautiful. I found it in a park so I don’t know what cultivar it is, but I’d like to have it in my yard. Believe it or not this is a columbine-a double flowered variety. Interesting, but I think I like the ordinary, single flowered columbines more.

Ornamental perennial salvia is blooming already. The culinary form of salvia is the herb known as sage. I’m wondering what fall will be like this year. Everything is blooming so early; I wonder if there will be anything left to bloom in September. Dogwood used to be a tree that you saw only occasionally, but now you see them everywhere-even at fast food restaurants. That doesn’t mean they are any less beautiful though. The sepals on this one were beyond white-I think the whitest I’ve seen on a plant. In a post I did recently called Under Cultivation I showed a photo of this flower and said I thought it might be a button bush, but I couldn’t be sure. Now I’m sure; it’s a native shrub related to witch hazel and is called Witch alder (Fothergilla major.) I’ve never seen this before this year, but I like it because it is so unusual. Witch alder (Fothergilla major.) 

Seed head of the pasque flower (Anemone patens,) which is almost as beautiful as the flower itself. One is just coming into bloom in the upper part of the photo. I saw a flash of color in the corner of my eye as I was driving and what I discovered, after I backed up and jumped out, was a wisteria vine trying hard to make it all the way to the top of a cherry tree.  The problem is I don’t know if it is a Chinese or Japanese wisteria. It’s doubtful that it is the American species because that one isn’t supposed to be hardy in New Hampshire. Whatever it is, it’s beautiful, and I want to go back later and try to identify it. Wisteria can grow under siding and shingles and actually tear them off, so they should never be planted near a house. Star of Bethlehem (Ornithogalum umbellatum), though beautiful, can overrun a garden. These flowers grow from a bulb and are native to southern Europe and Africa. The bulbs contain toxic alkaloids and have killed livestock, so they are now listed as an invasive species.


The common purple Lilac (Syringa vulgaris) is the state flower of New Hampshire so I guess I’d better include it here.  Their scent, along with the honeysuckle and autumn olive, makes doing anything outside so much more enjoyable. Lilacs were first imported into New Hampshire from England in 1750 and grown at the Portsmouth home of Governor Benning Wentworth. The original plants are still blooming today in that garden and are believed to be the oldest lilacs in America.

Give me odorous at sunrise a garden of beautiful flowers where I can walk undisturbed.  ~Walt Whitman

As always, I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing what is blooming here in New Hampshire, and this day I hope you’ll forgive my forgetfulness! Thank you for stopping by.

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More Wild Things

Posted in Nature, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 19, 2012| 9 Comments »

The most notable thing about this week has been the incredible fragrances of autumn olive and honeysuckle on the breeze. Both are invasive species but their fragrances can’t be matched by any native shrubs that I’m aware of blooming right now. There is no way to pass these fragrances on, but I can show you the flowers. The second most notable thing is that the lady’s slippers are blooming, and that’s always a harbinger of summer. I’ve been waiting for the pink lady’s slippers (Cypripedium acaule) to turn pink. When the “slipper” first begins to open it is a washed out, very pale yellow or off white color-enough to fool someone into thinking they’ve found a much rarer yellow lady’s slipper-then after 2 or 3 days it turns pink. These can be deep red to white, but not yellow. Pink lady’s slippers are the only slipper orchids that don’t have stem leaves, so they are easy to identify even when the flower hasn’t opened. If you look closely at any other lady’s slipper you will see slightly smaller leaves growing on the flower stalk. A pink lady’s slipper after opening, but before it turned pink. Note the leafless flower stalk. Lady’s slippers are about 2 weeks early; they usually bloom in June here, and they always tell me that summer is about to begin.Jack in the pulpits (Arisaema triphyllum) have finally unfurled their leaves. This plant can bloom as much as 2 weeks before its leaves unfurl. All of the “baby” plants around this older one don’t necessarily mean it will produce seeds because the plants also reproduce vegetatively.  Jack in the pulpit has a corm for a root and plants with this type of root often produce new corms each year. They are creating quite a large colony near a stream that I visit often. I like taking a peek under the hood of a Jack in the pulpit. The striping on this one is well defined. I don’t see any flowers forming at the base of the spadix (Jack) yet.Common fleabane (Erigeron philadelphicus.) Daisy fleabane looks much the same as common fleabane, but the leaves don’t clasp the stem like they do on common fleabane. Fleabane flowers are actually flower heads, made up of tiny yellow trumpet shaped flowers in the center disc and larger ray flowers around the outside. The ray flowers can be white or pale pink and the whole thing closes up at night. The word “bane” is a very old English word that means poison when it is part of a plant name, so fleabane is flea poison. Henbane wouldn’t be good for hens and baneberry means a poisonous berry. I found this plant on the roadside.Coltsfoot (Tussilago farfara) gone to seed. There was a plant blooming right next to this one and I have a picture of the flower, but I thought this seed head was far more interesting.Mouse ear chickweed (Cerastium vulgatum.) It is plants like this that keep the big herbicide companies making billions because they’ve convinced people that “fuzzy green patches don’t belong in their lawn.” They tell us that this “pesky plant loves to wreak havoc on the open spaces in our lawns and gardens,” but what they don’t tell us is how the plant was here long before lawns were even thought of.  A few hundred years ago in cottage gardens turf grasses were pulled as weeds so useful or edible plants like dandelion and chickweed could flourish. How times have changed! Yellow wood sorrel (Oxalis stricta) is another common lawn weed, but I like it even if it grows in my lawn. This plant is a native with leaves that resemble clover, but it isn’t a clover at all. The leaves fold up at night and when the plant is stressed. The setting sun fell hot on the plant in the photo which I think is why it folded its leaves. This plant prefers partial shade.  Creeping wood sorrel (Oxalis corniculata) is very similar but has deep, reddish purple leaves. Wood anemone (Anemone quinquefolia) is still blooming and I see it in a large range of environments, so it isn’t fussy about where it grows. This is a beautiful flower but is also extremely toxic and should never be eaten.This colony of wood anemones was lighting up a shaded slope near a river. Many anemones can be found in garden centers and they make excellent groundcovers. They are usually found with the flowering bulbs and are sometimes called wind flowers. Colors are blues, pinks, and yellows as well as white. Dwarf or Early Cinquefoil (Potentilla Canadensis) is often mistaken for a buttercup. This common native grows in fields, woods, and along roadsides. It grows low to the ground and isn’t often affected by mowing. The leaves resemble those of the strawberry and the plant spreads by runners like a strawberry, but this plant doesn’t bear fruit and its flower is yellow rather than white. It also has 5 leaflets instead of three. This one had bluets, which are still blooming, for neighbors. Lily of the valley (Convallaria majalis) is an old fashioned favorite that some make the mistake of planting in their garden. Lily of the valley spreads quickly and is hard to control, so it’s better planted away from garden beds at forest edges or along woodland paths. It is also very poisonous and the red berries that follow the flowers are attractive to kids, so they should be made aware of its dangers.Bush honeysuckle is an invasive plant, but I like the pink flowered species which is called Tartian honeysuckle (Lonicera tatarica.) Other invasive honeysuckle species have white flowers that turn yellow as they age, and they are the most fragrant. The red berries that ripen in midsummer are a favorite of birds, which explains why these plants are so widespread and nearly impossible to control. Soft, hairy leaves, 2 lower petals bearded, two upper petals more plain than the lower 3, and no notch at the base of the leaves all point to this plant being the Northern Downy Violet (Viola fimbriatula,) but to be honest there are so many different violets and their differences are so subtle that I never feel good about positively identifying any of them.  Let’s just call it a pretty little flower. A long time favorite wildflower of mine is blue eyed grass (Sisyrinchium augustifolium,) which isn’t a grass at all but is a plant in the Iris family. The flower has 3 petals and 3 sepals, all of which are the same color. These plants are hard to spot because they grow in full sun with tall grasses and other plants at the edges of mown fields and waste places. They are hard enough to find when blooming but when the small flowers close in late afternoon they can be almost impossible to find, so If you want to look for this plant get out into the meadows in the morning. Slender Blue Eyed grass (Sisyrinchium mucronatum) can also be found in New Hampshire.

I’ll tell you what hermits realize. If you go off into a far, far forest and get very quiet, you’ll come to understand that you’re connected with everything. ~Alan watts

I Hope you continue to enjoy seeing what’s blooming here in New Hampshire. Thanks for dropping in.

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Wild Things

Posted in Nature, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 16, 2012| 22 Comments »

This post is of more of what I find wandering through forests, swamps and fields. I was happy the day I went to a bog in a town called Fitzwilliam and saw Rhodora (Rhododendron canadense) blooming. These flowers appear on short (3 feet or less) upright shrubs that like to live in wet places. The ones I saw this day were growing in standing water in full sun. Rhodora, which is in the rhododendron family, is native to the northeastern U.S. and Canada and both Its western and southern limits are reached in Pennsylvania. The flowers appear before the leaves and light up the edges of swamps and bogs for a short time in spring. By mid-June they will be only a memory here.  On May 17, 1854 Henry David Thoreau wrote “The splendid Rhodora now sets the swamps on fire with its masses of rich color,” and indeed, that is exactly what it does. Ralph Waldo Emerson loved the flower so much he wrote a poem about it, titled “The Rhodora.”

 When I left the bogs I went to one of my favorite places alongside a small stream where the conditions are just right for many ferns, wildflowers and flowering shrubs. Many of the wildflowers seen in this blog are found along the banks of this stream. The soil is very rich, cool, and moist and there is a game trail that follows the stream.  Twice now I have startled a very large bird that suddenly flies up off the forest floor on the opposite side. Each time I’ve only seen the blur of big, dark wings.

 Like the Rhodora, foamflowers (Tiarella cordifolia) will soon be just a memory, but right now they are so thick in places on the forest floor that it’s hard to walk without crushing them. Foamflowers are also called false miterwort. This plant is native to the eastern U.S and likes moist, shaded forests with dappled sunlight.Part of a large foamflower colony. They like to grow on gentle slopes. White campion (Silene latifolia) can shade towards pink, which is what drew me to this one. The light pink color doesn’t show as well in the photo as it did in the field but you can see the deep cleft or split in the petals, which is a good way to identify it-it has 5 petals that at first glance look like 10. This plant is dioecious, meaning that male and female flowers are borne on different plants. One way to tell if a flower is male or female is by counting the veins on the bladder (calyx) behind it. Male plants have 10 veins on their calyx and females have 20. The plant in the above photo is a male. Soapwort (Saponaria officinalis) is very similar to campion with its bladder like calyx, but the petals aren’t cleft. This plant was introduced from Europe and prefers fields and waste places with soil on the dry side. Another plant that I was also most happy to (finally) see was gaywings (Polygala paucifolia.) Fellow New Hampshire blogger Jomegat has shown this plant several times on his blog and I commented that I couldn’t understand how I had walked through these New Hampshire woods for 50 years without seeing it. Now, once I found it I think I know why; to someone who is as color blind as I am, from a distance this flower easily passes as a violet.  Since I see thousands of violets each day, it is unlikely that I’d go out of my way to see another. In fact, I found a large patch of violets growing less than 10 feet from the gaywings. Now that I know what to look for, I’ll be paying much closer attention.  This plant is native to Canada and the U.S., but its range is limited to Minnesota to the west and Georgia to the south. Gaywings are supposed to grow in dry pine forests so I went to one. Unfortunately I found everything but gaywings here-they were growing alongside an old dirt road. This is an odd place-on this side of the trail the woods are open as you can see in the photo, but on the other side of the trail there is underbrush that is quite thick at times. There is a network of paths all through the brush because a lot of wildflowers like to hide there. A large swamp is nearby as well.I have found a lot of immature, foliage only may apples (Podophyllum peltatum) this year and had seen no flowers until I found this one nodding sleepily under its umbrella-like leaves.  This plant is also called American mandrake, which is legendary among herbalists for the root that supposedly resembles a man.  Though Native Americans used this plant medicinally, all parts of it are considered toxic except the “apple” which ripens in late summer.  If large amounts of those are eaten, even they can be poisonous. Native starflowers (Trientalis borealis) are everywhere in the woods right now in dry or moist soil. I always like to see how many flowers I can find on one plant. So far this year my record is three, but I’ve read of people finding four.  Starflowers are a plant based on sevens; seven leaves, seven petals, and seven sepals. At least, most of the time-if nature was to have a rule it would be that no rule in nature is hard and fast and the flower with 8 petals in the photo proves that.  Starflower leaves turn yellow and fade away in mid-summer, leaving behind a leafless stalk bearing a tiny seed capsule. Bellworts are also still blooming near the stream. I’ve been hoping to find the showy large flowered bellwort (Uvularia grandiflora.) I think the one in the photo is a sessile leaved bellwort (Uvularia sessilifolia,) which is commonly called wild oats. Dandelions are still blooming too, and this bumblebee seems very happy that they are. Scott over at the Little Crum Creek blog did a post on the red admiral butterfly (Vanessa atalanta) migration. Just as I finished telling him I had never seen one I stepped out the door and there one was, right in front of me. Unfortunately I was on the phone and had no camera, but Saturday I saw a large autumn olive (Elaeagnus umbellata) shrub on the edge of the forest that must have had hundreds of red admiral butterflies and bumblebees on it. These creatures don’t sit still for long, so this is the best shot I was able to get. If you want to see much better pictures of this beautiful butterfly you should click on the link to the Little Crum Creek blog. When I finished shooting pictures of the red admiral butterflies I looked down and discovered that I was standing in a good size patch of poison ivy (Toxicodendron radicans.) Good grief-you’d think someone who grew up in the woods would know better. There was nothing to be done except to ignore the imaginary itch and head back into the forest. And I was glad I did, because I got to see one of my favorite woodland flowers-the painted trillium (Trillium undulatum .) This year I was late in finding them though, so all I have to show for it is this one that is almost gone by. I wanted to still show it so people could see the beautiful “painted” throat of the flower. According to the USDA, painted trilliums grow as far west as western Tennessee and south to Georgia. This photo from Wikipedia shows what a newly opened painted trillium looks like. When you find a large colony of these in the forest you understand the true meaning of the word “breathtaking.” Tiny Persian speedwell (Veronica persica) is suddenly everywhere you look. I put a quarter on the plant to give an idea of the size of the flowers that I had convinced myself I had no hope of getting a picture of. I had to use a magnifying glass to find a flower that was fully open and then after taking about 20 pictures, I found one that was in focus. This native of Europe and Asia is considered a noxious lawn weed, but I love the sky blue color of the petals.  One way to identify this plant is by looking for flowers that have one smaller petal out of four. If you can see them. This is also one of the speedwells-thyme leaved speedwell (Veronica serpyllifolia.) The blossoms on this one, at about 1/8th of an inch across, are slightly larger than those on the Persian speedwell. They weren’t any easier to get a picture of though, and took several attempts. Thyme leaved speedwell is also considered a noxious lawn weed, but I like it. Note the one smaller petal of four again. I believe that all species of speedwell have one smaller petal- every one I’ve seen certainly has. I’ll leave you with a taste of things to come; this tiny cluster of what look like grapes are actually grape flower buds, so they are future grapes.  These were on a vine that I found growing in the woods.

Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.  ~Albert Einstein

Thanks for stopping in. Be safe in the woods.

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Under Cultivation

Posted in Nature, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 12, 2012| 15 Comments »

The blooming time is very short for spring ephemeral wildflowers so the chances are good that you’ll see them on just about any nature blog that you visit now, and rightly so- seeing them on a blog is the only way a lot of people get to see them. But, there are many other beautiful garden flowers blooming now that I think deserve a little bit of our time as well, so here are a few of those.

This native plant is called the pasque flower (Anemone patens.) “Pasque” refers to Easter, and some call it the Easter Flower. Others call it meadow anemone.  They are cold lovers that grow naturally on the tundra and prairies of Canada and the U.S. The showy lavender “petals” are actually sepals. The plant is in the buttercup family along with other plants like clematis, which I think it resembles. The seed heads that follow the flowers are also very showy. The pasque flower was used by Native Americans in childbirth but is considered toxic. Rabbits and deer will not eat it, so it is good in gardens that get night time critter visits. This Japanese bleeding heart (Dicentra spectabilis) grows in my yard and this is the earliest I’ve ever seen it bloom. These large plants are “summer dormant” so their foliage will yellow and die back to the ground by the end of June. This fern leaved or fringed bleeding heart (Dicentra eximia) also grows in my yard, and it’s blooming right on schedule. This is a native shade lover that will bloom until frost. I found this shrub growing in a local park and have no idea what it is. I think it might be a button bush (Cephalanthus,) but haven’t been able to positively identify it yet. I found this flowering crabapple (Malus) growing in a vacant lot. It was a true dwarf tree that was no more than 7 feet tall and was absolutely covered with pink, very fragrant flowers. It was a tree that any homeowner would love to have as a landscape specimen, but there it was in a vacant lot. Oh well-maybe more people are able to enjoy it that way. This barberry (Berberis) was also growing in the park, I thought the tiny yellow flowers and the deep maroon foliage were a nice combination. They were also quite difficult to get a decent picture of. There are several deep maroon /purple colored barberry hybrids with yellow flowers. This bishop’s hat or barrenwort (Epimedium) grows alongside some maidenhair fern in my yard. Some think that the tiny flowers resemble miniature columbine (Aquilegia.) This is a low growing plant that makes an excellent groundcover for shady areas; in my yard it might get an hour of sunlight each day. Bishop’s hat shouldn’t be confused with bishop’s cap, also called miterwort (Mitella,) which is an entirely different plant. I bought this shrub last year and planted it in my yard at the edge of the forest and so far am very happy with it. It’s from Japan and in the rose family so it is called Japanese rose (Kerria japonica.) Each lemon yellow blossom is about the size of a nickel. When fully grown it will be 6-8 feet tall and covered with thousands of flowers in early spring. Is this an azalea or a rhododendron? Gardeners haggle over which is which but the differences between them are so slight that botanists don’t separate the two; to a botanist they are all rhododendrons. The flowers on this small shrub were so beautiful that at the time I didn’t care what it was, but now I see that it’s an azalea. How? Most rhododendron blossoms will have 10 stamens while most azaleas have five or six, so counting the stamens will usually tell you what it is.I didn’t care much for the color of this dwarf bearded iris that I found growing in the park, but it has to take the prize for the earliest blooming iris that I’ve seen. This plant is called spurge and it is in the euphorbia family, which contains over 2000 species of plants including poinsettia, cassava, and many popular house plants. The variety shown here is called Euphorbia polychroma, variety “Bonfire.” If deer and rabbits have eaten your plants this is a good replacement, because they won’t touch it. Many plants in the euphorbia family have a milky, toxic sap. The longer yellow “petals” are actually bracts; the flowers are the very small yellow parts in the center of the bloom.

 I don’t think the early 80 degree temperatures we had in March forced the creeping phlox (Phlox stolonifera) into early bloom, but the plants seem to be blooming much longer than they usually do. I think it has been close to a month now that this plant in my yard has bloomed non stop.

If you truly love Nature, you will find beauty everywhere.  ~Vincent Van Gogh

I hope you haven’t minded straying away from wildflowers for a time. Flowers are beautiful whether wild or tame, so I think they all deserve equal time. Thanks for stopping by. Don’t forget mom’s day tomorrow!

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More Spring Flowers

Posted in Nature, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 9, 2012| 19 Comments »

There are flowers blooming everywhere here right now. I’m not sure how I’ll ever show them all to you, but I’ll do my best. Pussytoes (Antennaria) are popping up everywhere. One day I saw a large circular colony of them and noticed that half of them were a darker shade of gray than the other half. I went home and did some reading and found that there are close to 45 species of pussytoes! Ugh-a plant hunter’s worst nightmare comes true!  Pussytoes are a favorite of many butterfly species. Another common name for the plant is everlasting.  This is Garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata); an invasive plant once used as an edible pot herb. This plant forms large colonies and chokes out natives. It grows from 1-4 feet tall and has a strong but pleasant garlic / onion odor when the leaves are crushed. Garlic Mustard flower. Garlic Mustard spreads quickly and prefers growing in shaded forests. It isn’t uncommon to find areas where no growing thing can be seen on the forest floor but this plant. It is considered one of the worst invasive species because of its ability to spread rapidly and is found in all but 14 U.S. states, including Alaska and large parts of Canada. This plant is also in the mustard family and is called winter cress or yellow rocket (Barbarea vulgaris.) It is very easy to confuse with our native common field mustard (Brassica rapa or Brassica campestris.)  This plant is native to Africa, Asia and Europe and is found throughout the U.S. In some states it is considered a noxious weed. In the south it is called creasy greens. It is also known as scurvy grass due to its ability to prevent scurvy because of its high vitamin C content. A winter cress colony. Winter cress is about knee-high when it blooms in spring and stays green under the snow all winter. This habit is what gives it its common name.Foam flowers (Tiarella) are carpeting parts of the forest floor now and just coming into bloom. They are easy to spot because of their hairy, maple-like leaves and foot high flower stalks. The leaves are bright green at first and then turn a darker green sometimes mottled with brown. Many hybrids have been created and foam flowers are now popular in garden centers.  Eastern Redbud (Cercis Canadensis) is not native to New Hampshire and I have only seen two of the trees growing in this area. Both are on private property but this one had branches overhanging a sidewalk so I was able to get close to it. The hardiness of this tree can be questionable here unless trees started from northern grown seed are planted. Greater celandine (Chelidonium majus ) takes quite a long time to bloom after it makes its first appearance in early spring. I think I saw my first plant in early March and this is the first blossom I’ve seen since. This plant originally comes from Europe and Asia and is considered invasive. The yellow / orange colored sap that I think we all remember from childhood has been used medicinally for thousands of years, even though it is considered toxic and can irritate the skin and eyes. It is said that it can also cause liver damage if used incorrectly. This phlox was growing in a local park. I don’t know if it is our native Wild Blue phlox (Phlox divaricata) or not. Since there was an identical plant with pink flowers there I’m wondering if it isn’t Meadow phlox (Phlox maculata.) The two species look very much alike and unfortunately, I wasn’t paying close enough attention to make a positive identification. Golden Alexanders (Zizia aurea) are common in moist areas. These were growing in a sunny spot beside a stream.  They are native and are thought to be a good wetland indicator. They are also very beneficial to many insects and often used in butterfly gardens.  Golden Alexanders are in the carrot family (Apiaceae) along with many extremely toxic plants like water hemlock, which is deadly. Great care should be taken when using any wild plant from this family, especially if it has white flowers. Solomon’s seal (polygonatum biflorum) is also very early this year. I’m surprised that our recent cold nights didn’t harm it. This plant has been used medicinally for centuries. Each year the above ground stem leaves a scar, or “seal” on the underground stem, which is called a rhizome. Counting these scars will reveal the age of the plant. Jack in the pulpit (Arisaema triphyllum) is also called bog onion or Indian turnip. What is seen here is not the flower; the striped outer “pulpit” is a spathe, which is essentially a sheath that protects the flowers.  “Jack,” who lives under the pulpit just like an old time New England preacher, is a spadix, which is a fleshy stem that bears the flowers. Few actually see the small flowers of a Jack in the Pulpit because they form down inside the spathe. I usually open the pulpit for a moment just to see what Jack is up to. This early in the year Jack has just come up and is waiting for fungus flies who think they smell mushrooms to come and fertilize his flowers. If they do the spathe will die back and a cluster of green berry-like fruit will form where the flowers were. These will turn bright red after a time and a deer might come along and eat them, helping to spread the seeds.  Since this one is growing right next to a game trail by a stream, there is a good chance of that happening. The root, which is a corm, may be eaten if it is cooked thoroughly but is extremely toxic when uncooked. Johnny jump ups (Viola cornuta ) are doing just that in my lawn, which already needs mowing, so I’d better get it done. I’ll mow around the violets, bluets, pussy toes, wood sorrel, strawberries, and anything else that looks more interesting than grass.

Most of the flowers shown here are wildflowers but we shouldn’t forget that there are many beautiful cultivated flowers that also bloom in the spring. Next time I’ll show you some of those.  I hope you enjoy seeing what’s blooming here in New Hampshire. Thanks for stopping in.

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May Wandering

Posted in Nature, tagged , , , , , , , , , on May 5, 2012| 15 Comments »

Special Note: In case you haven’t heard today (Saturday) and tomorrow nights are nights of the “super moon,” when the moon is expected to appear 14 percent bigger and 30 percent brighter than at any other time this year. As if that weren’t enough, the Eta Aquarid meteor display also happens this weekend. Now back to our regularly scheduled blog post:

Every now and then I run across something that I think is really interesting so I take a picture of it. Then when I’m putting a blog post together quite often the interesting thing doesn’t really fit in, so it sits and waits for another post. This post contains all of those things that just wouldn’t fit in anywhere else. I hope you’ll think they are as interesting as I did. Opened cones of the Eastern white cedar or arborvitae (Thuja occidentalis.) I’ve seen many thousands of these but the color of these ones was simply amazing; a beautiful non-flower that looks like a flower. There was a big black slug beside these spring mushrooms, and I wondered if it had been eating them. From what I’ve read, this is most likely the slug called black arion (Arion ater,) also known as the European black slug, which is an invasive species. There is a catch all category of difficult to identify mushroom called LBMs, which stands for little brown mushrooms. Some are harmless and some, like those in the genus Galerina are deadly. They can grow in spring, summer or fall and are often found on logs. I wonder if they are toxic to slugs too. Oak marble gall. Galls can be caused by various insects laying their eggs on the twigs (usually a wasp.) The oak tries to protect itself by growing a gall around the insect eggs. Little does the oak know that this is exactly what the insect wants it to do; once the eggs hatch the larva eat their way out of the gall, leaving a tiny escape hole in the shell of an empty brown marble.  If you find one with no hole like those in the photo, an insect larva is still in residence. Iron sulfate mixed with tannic acid from oak galls made ink that was the standard writing and drawing ink from the 12th century until well into the 20th century. Some still use it today.

 This blue bottle fly was kind enough to hold still while I took its picture. I wish I could get a blue heron to do the same. Maybe I just have to start small and work my way up.

 This spent puffball caught my eye because it was bigger than a quarter. It wintered well. I don’t know what plant left these seed heads on all winter, but I like their furry, animal like appearance.

 I haven’t shown any lichens for a while, so here is a nice one. The rain we’ve had recently should plump most lichens up. Because this has a leafy look it is in the foliose lichen family. I haven’t shown any turkey tails (Trametes versicolor ) lately either. Here they are growing on a mossy tree trunk. I see them almost everywhere I go, but I’m still searching for a blue one. If I could find blue turkey tails and some blue lichens I’d be a mighty happy hiker.

These virgin’s bower (Clematis virginiana) seeds shining in the sun were an attention getter. Virgin’s bower is our native wild clematis vine that blooms anytime from July through September. It is usually found draped over shrubs or climbing up trees. Clusters of small white flowers cover the plant, and the hairy looking seeds that follow give it another common name: Old Man’s Beard. I have the cultivated variety that blooms in the fall growing on a trellis in my yard. The fragrance is unmatched. 

 The very top of a pine tree broke off and was lying on the ground in the middle of a trail. My grandmother had a cuckoo clock that used metal pine cones as weights to keep the clock running and those cones looked exactly like this one. I remember as a boy wanting those metal pine cones very badly, but I can’t remember why. Maybe it was because they tried to be as beautifully bronze-like as the real one shown here.

 This lone milkweed was the only one to escape the roadside mowing crew last year, and then it stood all through the winter. For perseverance alone, I thought it deserved having its picture taken. This is another tree root that I thought looked beautiful enough to have been carved by an artist. The smooth, sanded and polished look that comes to wood from weathering is amazing, and I always wonder how many years it took nature to create such a thing. I have a bookcase that holds several wooden art objects like this, and it’s very hard for me to leave these foundlings behind in the forest.  And that is precisely why I don’t carry a saw. 

This is the kind of weather we’ve seen here this week. I’m hoping for clearing so I can see the moon this weekend.

The human spirit needs places where nature has not been rearranged by the hand of man.  ~Author Unknown

I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing these things that I occasionally stumble upon in the fields and forests. Thanks for visiting. Be safe in the woods.

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White Flowered Roadside Trees and Shrubs

Posted in Nature, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on May 2, 2012| 14 Comments »

A question I usually hear at this time of year is “What are those white flowered trees and bushes along the roadsides?” Since there are countless white flowered trees and shrubs that bloom in the spring and a positive identification can mean checking the color of the tiny hairs found on the underside of leaves or counting how many seeds the fruit contains, that question is impossible to answer. So, this post is more about my passing on the little that I know about these trees and shrubs than positive identification. 

At this time of year a flowering tree with this shape would lead me to believe it was an apple (Malus) or crabapple. Crabapples are a subspecies of apple and the biggest difference is size. This is a crabapple I found growing wild along the side of the road. Crabapples and apples don’t often grow tight together in thickets, but it’s common to see them blooming along the edge of the woods. They’re usually seen tucked in among the evergreens every few miles and can get quite tall. This one just happened to be out in the open. Here is a close up of an apple blossom. My grandmother loved these fragrant beauties and as a boy I used to bring her armloads of them.  Apple blossoms are about the size of a nickel. They may be smaller if they are flowering crab apple blossoms. A tangled mess like this would lead me to suspect either hawthorn or wild plum. These are native wild plums (Prunus Americana) in this thicket and I found them by following the fragrance.  Plums have an incredible fragrance that won’t be forgotten once it is experienced. Like hawthorns, plum trees have thorns so care should be taken when getting in close to them.  These are wild plum blossoms. They are also about the size of a nickel, much like an apple blossom.  Small, one inch, edible red fruits will ripen by mid-summer. Like most of the white spring flowering trees, chokecherries (Prunus) and chokeberries (Aronia) grow on the edge of the forest. Though they look alike from a distance, chokeberries and chokecherries are only distantly related in the rose family. The common name is the giveaway here: A cherry is a stone fruit with one seed, so the chokecherry will have one seed. A berry will have multiple seeds- in the case of the chokeberry 5 or fewer.  Chokeberry flower clusters are smaller than chokecherry and kind of flat on top. Chokecherry flower clusters are usually long and cylindrical like a bottle brush. Positive identification between these two is important because chokecherry leaves and seeds contain prussic acid which can convert to cyanide under the right conditions, and it wouldn’t be good to eat too many seeds. The simplest way to be sure is by counting the seeds in a piece of fruit before picking and eating from the tree. Chokecherry flower cluster. Individual flowers are quite small-less than the diameter of a dime. Hmm. 5 white petals just like all the previous flowers, but where are the reproductive parts? The answer is that they’re right in the flowers where they belong-the small flowers in the center of this group, that is. The large flowers around the perimeter are about the size of a quarter or slightly larger and are sterile so they don’t need male and female flower parts. These are the flowers of the hobblebush (Viburnum lantanoides.)The hobblebush is a viburnum and appears as a small shrub at the forest edge or in clearings. The viburnum family is huge and contains many shrubs with beautiful and fragrant flowers. Many are used as landscape specimens. George Washington liked the hobblebush so much that he ordered five of them for Mount Vernon. The name comes from their habit of growing in dense thickets and tangling (or hobbling) horses. Another example of a hobblebush flower cluster. These clusters are between the size of a softball and baseball. Each of the smaller central flowers will become a bright red berry. This is another white flowered shrub growing on the edge of the forest, but its flowers are much smaller than that of the hobblebush. These flowers seem to float just between the understory shrubbery and the tree canopy. This is the shadbush (Amelanchier Canadensis,) so named because they blossomed when the shad fish ran in the rivers in spring. The common name serviceberry comes from their habit of blooming for Easter services. They are also called chuckle-berry, currant-tree, Juneberry, shadblow, and sugarplums. This native plant can grow in the form of a shrub or tree and can be anywhere from 5 to 30 feet tall. This shows one type of shadbush blossom. Naturalists and botanists have been arguing for years over the many native shadbush species and hybrids. The 5 white flower petals can appear quite different in each, but none of the several variations that I’ve seen have had blossoms bigger than a nickel. All of them seem to have multiple large stamens. Shadbushes bloom earlier than the other shrubs and trees shown here but are often still in bloom when the others bloom. The flowers appear before the leaves, unlike apples. Small, reddish purple to purple, apple shaped fruits follow in June. The fruit is a berry similar in size to a blueberry and has from 5-10 seeds. They taste best when they are more purple than red.

I hope this information will be a help to all of those who wonder what those white flowers along the roadsides are. This doesn’t cover all of them, but it’s a start. Thank you for stopping in.

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