Ramble Report May 19 2016

Today's Ramble was lead by Dale Hoyt. Here's the link to Don's Facebook album. (All the photos in this post are compliments of Don.) Today's post was written by Dale Hoyt.

Twenty-four Ramblers met today, only to have the ramble cut short by rain.

Announcements:

·        Rambles in June, July and August will begin at 8:00AM.

·        Linda Chafin's new book, Field Guide to the Wildflowers of Georgia and Surrounding States, is available at the Garden shop. If you are a member of the Friends of the State Botanical Garden of Georgia you can get a discount if you buy the book there. Plus, they have autographed copies!

 Yesterday Emily and I discovered a large female turtle, a River Cooter, excavating a nest and laying eggs. While we watched she deposited 15 eggs, each a little smaller than a ping-pong ball.

Today's reading:

Lee read a short passage from Windsor Forest by Alexander Pope, the 18th century English poet:

ln genial Spring, beneath the quiv'ring shade,
Where cooling vapours breathe along the mead,
The patient fisher takes his silent stand,

Intent, his angle trembling in his hand,

With looks unmov' d, he hopes the scaly. breed,
And eyes the dancing cork and bending reed.
Our plenteous streams a various race supply,
The bright-eyed perch with fins of Tyrian dye,
The silver eel, in shining volumes roll'd,

The yellow carp, in scales bedropp'd with gold,
Swift trouts, diversified with crimson stains,
And pikes, the tyrants of the wat'ry plains.

Alexander Pope, Windsor Forest; lines 135-146

 Weather information:

I use the following two sites to determine if the Ramble should be cancelled: Weather Underground and forecast.weather.gov. This morning at 6AM they disagreed about the probability of rain and I decided to gamble on the government prediction. This is the first time that our scheduled Ramble has been interrupted by rain. There have been a few times when we cancelled and the predicted rain never appeared.

Today's route:

Paved walkway to see the flower of Bigleaf magnolia; into the Dunson Garden. Rain became heavy so we abandoned the ramble.

What we looked at:

Bigleaf Magnolia flower

Tim measures a big leaf -- 28.75 inches long

Indian Pink

Rough Daisy Fleabane

White Beard-tongue

White Beard-tongue; note purple lines

 

Before the rain descended and terminated our ramble we took note of:

Bigleaf Magnolia (Magnolia macrophylla): This tree has the largest flowers and leaves of any North American tree. Of trees with simple leaves it is the champion in leaf size. Only the Hercules Club, which has doubly pinnately compound leaves, has a larger leaf.

Black Cohosh (Actea racemosa): The flower spikes are up and covered with buds that will not open for another week or two.

Southern Beard-tongue (Penstemon australis): The delicate purple lines in the flower will distinguish this from other beard-tongues in our area.

Rough Daisy Fleabane (Erigeron strigosus): There are several fleabanes in our area; identification relys on the number of ray florets, the hairiness of the stems and size and attachment of the leaves. (It might be satisfactory to just call them fleabanes.)

Indian Pink (Spigelia marilandica): There is no other plant with such a flower -- bright red on the outside and bright yellow on the inside.