Ramble Report July 12 2018

Today's Ramble was led by Linda Chafin.

Here's the link to Don's Facebook album for today's Ramble. (All the photos in this post are compliments of Don.)

Today's post was written by Linda Chafin (plants) & Dale Hoyt (animals).

Today’s Focus: Staying in the shade.

26 Ramblers met today.

Announcements:

·        Cine get its building:  Athens local, non-profit cinema, Cine, announced that it had reached its goal of purchasing the building it inhabits, due to contributions by people like us. Gary explained that the Nature Ramblers donated enough to “purchase” an entire row of seats in the theater. Each seat will have a plaque attached bearing the contributor’s name and short message. The entire row will have a plaque identifying it as “Rambler Row,” according to Gary.

·       Upcoming Lecture
Beyond 1492: The Columbian Exchange
Dr. Benjamin Ehlers, UGA Department of History
Tuesday, July 17, 1:30 pm, Gardenside Room
The State Botanical Garden of Georgia

The historian Alfred Crosby used the term Neo-Europes to describe the regions of the world flooded by European emigrants after 1492. North America, Australia, Argentina: these areas shared Europe’s climate, but lacked the natural competitors to check the expansion of Old World flora and fauna. “Weeds” – a word Crosby applied to animals and microbes as well as noxious plants – thrived in their new environment, as witnessed by the spread of peaches, oranges, and rye, as well as feral pigs and horses. Beyond the navigational skill of Columbus and the military acumen of Cortés, the European colonization of new worlds depended upon the propagation of crops, livestock, and diseases such as smallpox.

This presentation will begin with a discussion of Crosby’s model, with reference to the voyages of Columbus and the Spanish conquest of Mexico. We will then proceed to the Heritage Garden to reflect upon the lasting results of the Columbian exchange in the American Southeast.

Today's reading: Linda read This is dragonfly season by Laura Lee Davidson (1870-1949), from A Winter of Content (1922), about a year spent alone on Canada’s Lake of Many Islands

This is dragonfly season

This is dragonfly season. Millions of them are darting through the air–great green and brown ones with a wingspread of 3 to 4 inches; wee blue ones, like lances of sapphire light; little inch-long yellow ones, and beautiful, rusty-red.

Today I spent three hours on the dock watching one make that wonderful transition from the life amphibious to the life of the air… I was tying the boat, when I saw what looked like a very large spider crawling up from the water and out on a board. It moved with such an effort and seemed so weak that I was tempted to put it out of its pain… Then I noticed a slit in its humped back, and a head with great, dull beads of eyes pushing out through the opening. Then I sat down to watch, for I realized that this was birth – not death.

Very slowly the head emerged and the eyes began to glow like lamps of emerald light. A shapeless, pulpy body came working out and two feeble legs pushed forth and began groping for a firm hold… Then, little by little, and ever so slowly, the whole insect struggled out, and lay weak, almost inanimate, beside the empty case that held it prisoner so long.

Two crumpled lumps on either side began to unfurl and show as wings. The long abdomen, curled round and under, like a snail-shell, began to uncurl and change to brilliant green... The transparent membrane of the wings, now held stiffly erect, began to show rainbow colors, as they fanned slowly in the warm air, and, at last, nearly three hours after the creature had crept out of the water, the great dragon-fly stood free, beside its cast-off body lying on the dock.

There it stood, that living jewel, growing every moment more strong, more exquisite, waiting perhaps for some trumpet call of its life. Suddenly it stiffened, the great wings shot out horizontally, and with one joyous, upward bound, away it flashed, an embodied triumph, out across the shining water, straight up into the glory of the sun.

Show & Tell:

Tom discovered a few wings of a Regal Moth on the sidewalk coming down from the parking area.

This is what the intact moth looks like:

Regal Moth (AKA Royal Walnut Moth)(By Kadoka1 [CC BY-SA 3.0  (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], from Wikimedia Commons)

James reported seeing, on the way into the garden, an Armadillo with four babies. Susie told us they always have four offspring and Dale said that all four are genetically identical: identical quadruplets. Jeff reminded us that armadillos were not native to our area and have come from two sources: Florida and west of the Mississippi River.

Today's Route: From the Visitor Center we took the sidewalk toward the Flower Bridge and International Garden, passing by the the American South section, crossing the Flower Bridge, passing the China and Asia section and on through the Native America/Southern Tribes section. We returned to the Visitor Center through the Herb and Physic Garden.

LIST OF OBSERVATIONS:

Plaza:

American Toad or, possibly, Fowler's Toad

Several American (or Fowler's) Toads were seen on the Sphagnum Moss islands in the fountain.

Blue Dasher dragonfly
Wings are held horizontally and at right angles to the body.

Blue Dasher dragonflies perch on taller vegetation to give them a clear view of the pond. Notice how they hold their wings horizontally and at right angles to their body.
Dragonflies and Damselflies belong to the insect order Odonata, which is from the Greek and means “tooth.” It refers to the teeth on the mandibles of the adult. A more familiar word that has the same Greek root is the dental specialist called an orthodontist. The “odont” part of that word refers to teeth.

A Damselfly (from Japan) showing the wings held over the back.(By LaitcheLink to My Website. [Public domain], from Wikimedia Commons)

Compare the way the wings are held by this damselfly with the dragonfly above.
Damselflies are more delicate and smaller than dragonflies but share many of the same habits. They have an aquatic larval stage that is predacious, like the dragonfly larvae. The adult damselfly captures flying insects, as do the dragonflies, and eats them. When at rest they hold their wings together over their back.

Cicada Killer wasps were still active around the steps leading down from the main plaza.

Female Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly on the banana plants.

Sweet Bay Magnolia

Sweet Bay Magnolia
Closeup showing leaves and developing fruits in the "cone."

Sweet Bay Magnolia is one of seven species of Magnolia that are native to Georgia. The name comes from its fragrant leaves (spicy) and flowers (lemony-sweet). It’s abundant in acidic Coastal Plain wetlands as one component of a plant community called a “bay head” or “bay swamp,” where it usually is accompanied by two other evergreen trees:  Swamp Red Bay Persea palustris in the Laurel Family and Loblolly Bay Gordonia lasianthus in the Tea Family (no kin to Loblolly Pine!).  Sweet Bay also turns up in a few wetlands in the Piedmont. Its flowers and fruits closely resemble those of the Southern Magnolia but on a much smaller scale.

Ambrosia Beetle activity on Japanese Maple

Don talked about recent Ambrosia Beetle activity on one of the Japanese Maples and the University's attempts to contain the damage using a systemic insecticide/fungicide combination introduced into the tree's vascular system with spikes.  Several of the “toothpicks” produced by the beetles as they burrow were still present on the tree trunks.  One of the major sub-branches of the tree appeared to be dead or dying.  This could be unrelated to the beetle as the limb had several places where there was evidence of old damage or disease.

American South:  

Purple Coneflower, with its dark pink ray flowers and spiny, central cone of disk flowers, is attracting some honey bees.

Cut-leaf Coneflower is also known as Green-eyed Susan because the central cone of disk flowers is green

Blazing Star; not the split styles.

Blazing Star is a member of the composite family, as is the Purple Coneflower, but its flower heads lack the showy whorl of ray flowers. Instead, its flower heads hold only disk flowers, each with showy style branches that call in pollinators.

Immature Broadhead Skink on Willow Oak

There are three species of skinks that live in our area. The young of all of them have bright blue tails, dark bodies with bright yellow stripes that run from head to the base of the tail. They can be told apart by details of the scalation, but you have to have the skink in hand to determine which species it is.

As the skinks age they change color. They lose the blueness of the tail and the stripes vanish. The body becomes gray with shades of brown.

One of the three, the Broadhead Skink, is actually arboreal, meaning that it is often found in trees. The other two species are found under rocks and logs and never climb trees. As its name implies, adult males of the Broadhead Skink have very large, muscular heads. During the mating season the heads of the males turn a reddish color. James and I tried to corner the skink and it ran UP the tree trunk, confirming that it was the arboreal Broadhead Skink.

Garden Phlox

Garden Phlox is native but uncommon in north Georgia where it’s found on streambanks and in moist forests and woodlands. It is widely available in the horticultural trade as several different cultivars with flowers ranging from white to deep pink.

The right red flowers of Scarlet Bee-balm attract lots of bees and ruby-throated hummingbirds. Its square stem; opposite, strongly scented leaves; and tubular, two-lipped flowers indicate membership in the Mint Family.

Appalachian Bergamot with a nectar robbing Bumblebee.

Appalachian Bergamot is a close relative to Scarlet Bee-balm and has flowers of the same shape but they are white to pale pink in color. Despite the name, it occurs in the Piedmont as well as the mountains.

Yellowwood seed pods.

Yellowwood is a rare tree in Georgia, found only in our high elevation, rich mountain coves with high pH soils. It has clusters of white flowers (like Black Locust), small bean pods for fruit (like Redbud), smooth gray bark (like Beech), and alternate leaves with alternate leaflets (like nothing else in our area). The remnant bean pods we saw today testify to its membership in the Legume Family.

Mountain Silverbell with four-winged fruits

Mountain Silverbell is one of three species of Silverbell in Georgia. It is most abundant in the mountains but occurs throughout Georgia. Its specific epithet is tetraptera which refers to its four-winged fruit (tetra = four,  ptera = wing).

Hibiscus sp. flower

This plate-sized flower of a non-native Hibiscus in the International Garden has many of the same features as the flowers of Georgia’s six species of native Hibiscus.

Epicalyx of Hibiscus flower

The whorl of narrow green bracts beneath the calyx (which cups the base of the flower) is called an epicalyx and is a good indicator of the Hibiscus genus.

Fused stamens surround the ovary and style.

Another characteristic trait of Hibiscus is the conspicuous tube of fused stamens that extends from the center of the flower. The tube surrounds the ovary and style, and a five-branched stigma emerges from the top of the tube.

The five-branched stigma of the Hibiscus flower.

Hibiscus flowers are open for only one day. To prevent self-pollination, the stigma and the pollen-bearing anthers in a given flower will “ripen” at different times of the day. However, if the flowers are not visited by pollinators and cross-pollination does not occur by the end of the day, the styles will curl downwards, bringing the stigmas into contact with the anthers and effecting self-pollination. Even though self-pollination usually results in offspring with less genetic diversity (called inbreeding depression) than the offspring of cross-pollination, evolution has apparently “decided” that depressed offspring are better than no offspring at all.

Flower Bridge:

Spotting a Green Frog (Rana (Lithobates) clamitans) in the pool below the Flower Bridge stimulated a discussion about the difference between Bullfrogs and Green frogs. Both species live in permanent lakes, ponds or pools. Bullfrogs are larger, up to 8 inches in length; Green frogs up to 5 inches. The breeding calls are very different. The Bullfrog’s call a deep, bass “aroom,” and the Green frog’s call a “plunk” or “gulp.” It’s better to listen to a recording than to depend on written descriptions: here’s a Bullfrog call and here’s a Greenfrog call.

Fragile Forktail damselfly resting on the bottom of a vial. The inside diameter of the vial is 3/4 inch, so the damselfly is shorter than that.

We managed to catch a tiny Fragile Forktail damselfly, less than 3/4 inch in length, that had landed on the flowers on the bridge. The small size of this delicate creature prompted some people to ask if it would get any larger.

The short answer is no! This answer applies not just to damselflies but to all adult insects. After hatching from the egg the immature stages of insects will feed and grow to a size limited by their exoskeleton. To grow further they must shed the old exoskeleton, a process called molting. A typical insect undergoes five molts before it becomes an adult (i.e., mature; capable of reproduction). Each time it molts it can grow in size but it remains immature until after the last molt. How much it grows during the intermolts depends on how much food it finds or is fed. After the final molt it can grow no further. It’s final exoskeleton lasts for the duration of its life. There is no further growth of an adult insect, although they may, and do, eat, the food they consume goes into supporting their activity and the production of eggs and sperm. Small butterflies won’t grow into larger butterflies. All they get to do is mate, lay eggs and die. An adult female Preying Mantis doesn’t grow anymore but it will, like a human female, gain weight. That weight gain goes to the development of its eggs.

Bald Cypress seed cones.

Bald Cypress seed cones are almost round; they will mature and shatter later this year, dispersing the seed.

James was interested in collecting seed but didn’t know how to do it. This is from Wikipedia:

“The seed cones are green and mature to grayish brown, globular, and 2.0–3.5 cm (³⁄₄–1 ³⁄₈ in) in diameter. They have from 20 to 30 spirally arranged, four-sided scales, each bearing one, two, or rarely three triangular seeds. Around 20-40 seeds are in each cone. The cones disintegrate at maturity to release the large seeds.”

Fruits of the Bottlebrush Buckeye, held at the tips of the long flower stalks, are just beginning to mature. Most of the flowers in the elongated clusters are male, pollen-producing flowers; only the flowers near the tip of the cluster are female and capable of producing fruits.

Silvery Checkerspot

Asia and China Section:

Camellias are a common sight in gardens throughout the south but only rarely do you see the most famous Camellia of all, the Tea Plant, from which all types of true teas are made, whether white, green, or black. (When we talk about herbal teas, we should really put the word “tea” in quotation marks.) Native to southeast China, the Tea Plant is now cultivated in many parts of the world, though the best quality teas are thought to come from northern India.

A group of Datana sp. caterpillars on Chinese Witch Hazel.

A single Datana sp. caterpillar in defense posture. Head is to left, tail to right.

A Chinese Witch Hazel gave us a surprise – a tightly packed colony of moth caterpillars. (We embarrassed ourselves by first identifying them as sawfly larvae.) These may be caterpillars of the Yellow-necked Caterpillar Moth, Datana ministra, but it would be safer to just list it as Datana sp. because the other species look very much alike as caterpillars. They feed together in a tight cluster and, when disturbed, all simultaneously raise their head end and abdominal end. Whether this works to prevent them from being eaten is unknown, but it is entertaining.

Paperbark Maple, with backlit peeling orange paper-thin bark

Virginia Jumpseed is a great choice for a shady native garden with moist soil. Native plants have small white flowers, but there are cultivars available in the trade with red flowers. The leaves are often marked with a brown chevron.

We keep finding newly metamorphosed toads. Some are American Toads and others are Eastern Spadefoots (often called Spadefoot Toads). Here’s a summary of the differences:

American Toad:

Warty skin

**Large, elongated parotoid gland behind the eye

Pupil is horizontally elliptical

Hind feet lack a “spade.”

Male breeding call a high pitched trill 5 or more seconds in duration.

Listen to recording of the American Toad call. (This video has a photo of the American Toad with a very prominent parotoid gland.)

Eastern Spadefoot:

Skin smoother, with tiny, fine warts.

**Parotoid gland is small, inconspicuous and circular; on shoulder.

Pupil is vertically elliptical.

Hind feet with a black “spade.” This website has a photograph of the spade on an Eastern Spadefoot’s feet.

Back sometimes with a lighter mark like a pair of reversed parentheses: “)(“

Male breeding call a coarse, low pitched “eww.” A dense chorus sounds like machinery operated in the distance.

Many of these characteristics are difficult to see in a newly metamorphosed individuals.

**A parotoid gland is generally located behind the eye of true toads, although a few other kinds also have them. It secretes a milky fluid that contains substances that affect the heart and nervous system. The secretion is produced only after the animal has been grossly mishandled, as when grabbed by a dog or when the gland is forcibly squeezed to expel the fluid.

Native America/Southeast Tribes Section:

Plumleaf Azalea is native to a small area along the Georgia-Alabama border, where it occurs in moist ravines along the Chattahoochee and Flint rivers, mostly south of the Fall Line.

Splash-cups of the Striate Bird's Nest Fungus. Raindrops striking the inside of the cup help disperse the spores.

By the way, many Ramblers think they can’t pronounce the scientific names of the plants we see in the Garden. However, I noticed that most folks had no problem today talking about Phlox, Magnolia, Hibiscus, or Camellia. See–not so hard!

SUMMARY OF OBSERVED SPECIES:

American Toad	Bufo (Anaxyrus) americanus
Blue Dasher dragonfly	Pachydiplax longipennis
Cicada Killer wasp	Sphecius speciosus
Eastern Tiger Swallowtail	Papilio glaucus
Sweet Bay Magnolia	Magnolia virginiana
Japanese Maple	Acer palmatum
Ambrosia Beetle	Xylosandrus crassiusculus (?)
Purple Coneflower	Echinacea purpurea
Cut-leaf Coneflower /Green-eyed Susan	Rudbeckia laciniata
Broad-headed Skink	Plestiodon laticeps
Willow Oak	Quercus phellos
Garden Phlox	Phlox paniculata
Scarlet Bee-balm	Monarda didyma
Appalachian Bergamot	Monarda fistulosa
Bumblebee	Bombus sp.
Blazing Star	Liatris spicata
Yellowwood tree	Cladrastis kentukea
Mountain Silverbell	Halesia tetraptera
Hibiscus	Hibiscus sp.
Flower Beetle	Family Scarabaeidae
Fragile Forktail	Ischnura posita
Bald Cypress	Taxodium distichum
Bottlebrush Buckeye	Aesculus parviflora
Silvery Checkerspot	Chlosyne nycteis
Tea Plant	Camellia sinensis
Chinese Witch Hazel	Hamamelis mollis
Datana moth caterpillars	Datana sp.
Voodoo Lily	Dracunculus vulgaris
Paperbark Maple	Acer griseum
Virginia Jumpseed	Persicaria virginiana
Eastern Spadefoot	Scaphiopus holbrookii
Plumleaf Azalea	Rhododendron prunifolium
Striate Bird's Nest Fungus	Cyathus striatus

SUMMARY OF OBSERVED SPECIES

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