Ramble Report October 18 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.

Today’s Focus: Grasses and whatever we found in the ROW.

21 Ramblers met today.

Announcements:

1.      Linda introduced Anne Shenk, retired Education Director at the Garden and one of the original co-founders (with retired Assistant Director Shirley Berry) of the “Circle of Hikers,” in the Fall of 2010. That group was the precursor of our present-day “Nature Ramblers.”

2.      Dale introduced his brother, Paul, visiting from Arizona.

3.      Avis told us about a proposed shooting range to be constructed one mile from the Appalachian Trail. Use this link to get more information about public input on the issue

4.      The NR book group determined their meeting time and selected the books to read over the next year. The first meeting will be at 11:30 am, after the Nov. 15 ramble. The book to be read and discussed is American Wolf, by Nate Blakeslee. If you were unable to attend either of the two organizational meetings and want to participate in the book group send an email to Emily (egenecarr AT gmail.com). The complete list of books being read is available at this link.

Today's reading: Linda read a poem, Fungus on Fallen Alder at Lookout Creek by Ellen Bass. You can find the text and listen to the author read her poem at this link. Don deduced that the fungus in the poem is the Turkey Tail, Trametes versicolor.

Today's route: From the plaza we walked down the road to the White Trail and turned right, continuing to the power line ROW, where we walked uphill among the grasses, seeking what we found. We then walked downhill and a smaller group of Ramblers visited the Mimsie Lanier Center to view the Georgia Asters, before returning to the Visitor Center for refreshments and conversation, followed by another meeting of the Nature Rambler book group

LIST OF OBSERVATIONS:

ROW (off trail, between the access path and the woods):

Continuing with our fall exploration of grasses, Nature Ramblers plunged into the grassy eastern edge of the Nash Prairie Project (aka powerline right-of-way).

Silver Plume grass standing tall above the other grasses

From this elevated viewpoint we could look south into the plantings of Silver Plume Grass that were just catching the first rays of the morning sun. Silver Plume Grass is the tallest grass we have in the Piedmont and easy to spot on any roadside from August through November. We have watched the seed heads since August: they begin as silvery-pink fans, transition to tan spikes at full flowering, and are now moving into the seed dispersal stage, where they become large, fluffy plumes, open to passing breezes that pick up the hair-tipped seeds and spread them far and wide.

Ants attracted to the Silver Plume grass seed heads

Though the flowers are wind-pollinated, the plumes seem to attract a lot of insects at every stage. This particular plume has attracted lots of ants.

Eastern Needle Grass is a cool-season grass, meaning it flowered in the spring. The seed head is long gone, and the leaves look pretty generically “grassy.”  But if you are in a dry upland area, you can still identify this grass by grasping a clump of its narrow leaves in your fist, and pulling it up through your hand. Tiny stiff hairs that cover the upper surface and margins of the leaves will “grab” your hand as you pull up.

Southeastern Wild-rye

Southeastern Wild-rye is rare in the Nash Prairie (though not generally), so it was a treat to find this old seed head. It’s another cool-season grass, blooming last May and June. But its dry seed head sticks around for nearly a year and is easily recognized by the long, stiff, upright bristles that arise at the tip of each floret.

Splitbeard Bluestem

Splitbeard Bluestem is the most common warm-season grass in the prairie area. You can identify it by its distinctly striped stem: blue-green leaf sheaths alternating with reddish stretches of stem. If the seed head is mature, it forks into two small upright spikes that are densely covered with white hairs.

Yellow-orange anthers (the pollen-producing part of the stamen) and pink, brushy stigmas that “comb” pollen from the air are obvious in this photo of a Splitbeard seed head.

 

Slender Indian grass

Slender Indian grass, with its glossy, arching seed head, is flowering along the edge of the right-of-way.

Velvet Witch Grass

Velvet Witch Grass is flowering now, its second time this year. All members of the Witch Grass genus (Dichanthelium) flower in the spring then a second time in the fall. The flowers are tiny, green, teardrop-shaped spikelets.

Purple Three-awn Grass

Purple Three-awn Grass is close kin to Wire Grass, the species always paired ecologically with longleaf pine in the Coastal Plain. Purple Three-awn lacks the long, needle-like leaves of Wire Grass but shares the three-forked bristles held at the tip of the spikelets.

There really are three awns!

These bristles twist in response to changes in humidity, “screwing” the seed into the ground.

Yaupon Holly's response to mowing

A low clump of Yaupon Holly, usually a tall shrub, is spreading laterally on the edge of the woods. It has been mown every year or so and resembles a ground cover.  Anne told us about making the famous “black drink” that Native Americans used as part of ritual purging. She dried the leaves in a slow oven and made the tea as usual. She reported that it was better with a shot of whisky.

Late Purple Aster

Now is the season for those “confusing fall asters,” the botanical equivalent of birders’ confusing fall warblers. Late Purple Aster, with its purple ray flowers and yellow disk flowers, looks a lot like the twenty or so other purple-flowered asters in Georgia. This one can distinguished by its small, sand-papery, clasping leaves and its dry, upland habitat.

Georgia Aster

Coming into its own now is the uncommon, and uncommonly beautiful, Georgia Aster. It looks like Late Purple Aster, but its flower head is larger, the ray flowers are a deeper purple, the disk flowers are white or lavender. Its leaves are very sand-papery and clasp the stem. Typically found in areas with slightly higher pH soil than the typical Piedmont upland, it flourishes at the Mimsie Lanier Center from mid-October to mid-November.

Frost Aster

Calico Aster is one of dozens of white-flowered, fall-blooming asters in Georgia, as tough as, if not tougher, to identify as the purple asters. The one we see in the Nash Prairie is called Calico Aster, recognizable by the low number of ray flowers (8 – 12) and tiny leaves on side branches.

Horseweed

A large but inconspicuous member of the Composite Family–Horseweed–is flowering now. It’s in the group of composites that have no ray flowers. All the heavy reproductive lifting is done by tiny white disk flowers tightly grouped into inch-long cylinders of green bracts. It’s hard to imagine pollinators finding these obscure flowers but Horseweed is one of the most common roadside “weeds” in the Piedmont, so it must be doing something right. It is one of the first species to come into an old field once active farming is stopped, and it thrives in disturbed areas such as rights-of-way and roadsides. It can reach six feet in height but its narrow leaves and drab flower heads mean it remains somewhat invisible to wildflower lovers.

Dog Fennel

Dog Fennel is another six-foot native composite that seems to specialize in disturbed areas. Its flower heads are inconspicuous, actually minute, and nearly indistinguishable from the slender leaflets that hug the branches. Because I know of its aggressive nature, I don’t pay it much attention, but some people find its large, feathery flower clusters quite beautiful. When crushed, the leaves and flower heads smell (to me) like a cross between a wet dog and fennel. Oh, maybe that’s where… oh, never mind. Wikipedia has an interesting story about this species (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eupatorium_capillifolium):

“Johnny Appleseed planted dogfennel, also known as mayweed, during his travels in the early 19th century, believing it to be an antimalarial. Dogfennel already had a reputation for invasiveness, however, so Appleseed's practice invited controversy. Harper's New Monthly Magazine in 1871 gave Appleseed credit for the overabundance of dogfennel: ‘The consequence was that successive, flourishing crops of the weed spread over the whole country and caused almost as much trouble as the disease it was intended to ward off; and to this day the dog-fennel, introduced by Johnny Appleseed, is one of the worst grievances of the Ohio farmers.^{’ “}

Blazing Star florets showing the style branches

Blazing Stars are among the most beautiful of the fall-flowering composites and are found throughout Georgia in many different habitats. They are another composite “that didn’t get the memo” about having both types of flowers:  they have only disk flowers, usually bright pink with showy style branches that attract pollinators. The style branches are tipped with “sticky stigmas” that capture pollen and convey it to the ovary where fertilization takes place. The species we have in the Nash Prairie is Rough Blazing Star, notable for its widely spaced heads and narrow, roughly hairy leaves.

Pussytoes

Pussytoes, another composite, are still looking great, though their flowering occurred last spring. The spoon-shaped leaves, thickly coated on the lower surface with white hairs, are distinctive year-round.

Tall Thistle seed head

Our native Tall Thistles, which attract so many butterflies in late summer, have gone to seed. Each seed is equipped with plumose bristles up to an inch long that aid in wind-dispersal. The seeds are a favorite of finches.

Slender-leaved False Foxglove

False Foxglove, a member of the snapdragon family, is another fall delight – we have 18 species in Georgia, all of which flower in September and October. This species, Slender-leaved False Foxglove, is notable for its very narrow leaves and the small upper petal that folds halfway over.

Lespedeza seed pods

Our native Lespedezas are in seed now, recognizable by their trifoliate leaves and single-seeded pods (legumes).

Sweet Autumn Clematis seeds

The exotic species, Sweet Autumn Clematis, is in fruit. Several flattened carpels, each tipped with hairs that aid in dispersal, radiate from a central point. Our native Virgin's-bower Clematis (not shown here) has similar fruits.

Mushroom with unexpanded cap; sliced in half, it shows the spore-bearing gills next to the stem.

A nice patch of agaric mushrooms had recently emerged in an area of the lower right-of-way, ranging in size from buttons to five inches high. None had spread their caps to show off their gills, so Dale made a long section through the cap and stem to expose the undeveloped gills.

A bolete mushroom; the cap lacks gills and is spongy, riddled with pores where the spores are produced.

Bolete mushrooms are also “fruiting” now. These are gill-less fungi–they release spores from tiny pores on the under surface of the cap.

SUMMARY OF OBSERVED SPECIES:

Silver Plume Grass	Erianthus alopecuroides
Yaupon Holly	Ilex vomitoria
Slender-leaved False Foxglove	Agalinis tenuifolia
Black Needle Grass	Piptochaetium avenaceum
Splitbeard Bluestem	Andropogon ternarius
Southeastern Wild Rye	Elymus glabriflorus
Horseweed	Conyza canadensis
Velvet Witch Grass	Dichanthelium scoparium
Late Purple Aster	Symphyotrichum patens
Calico Aster	Symphyotrichum lateriflorum
Roundhead Lespedeza (or Bush-clover)	Lespedeza capitata
Three-cornered Alfalfa Treehopper	Spissistilus festinus
Rough Blazing Star	Liatris aspera
Slender Indian Grass	Sorghastrum elliottii
Dog Fennel	Eupatorium capillifolium
Pussytoes	Antennaria plantaginifolia
Purple Three-awn Grass	Aristida purpurea
Tall Thistle	Cirsium altissimum
Georgia Aster	Symphyotrichum georgianum