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, unless otherwise credited.)
Today's post was written by Linda Chafin.
Today’s Focus:
38 Ramblers met today.
NOTE
ABOUT THE PHOTOGRAPHS: Click on any photograph to see the original size. Then click again
to return to the text.
Show and
Tell:
Eastern
Anglepod seed pod and seeds. © John B. Nelson, www.namethatplant.net |
Brown brought
some Eastern Anglepod seed pods and seeds to show us. Eastern Anglepod is one
of nine species of climbing milkvines in the southeast. Sharp, almost winged,
angles run the length of the okra-like fruit. The seeds are black and flat and
tipped with a tuft of long, white hairs, called a coma, that help disperse the
seeds.
Purple False Fox-glove |
Kathy brought
a sprig of Purple False Fox-glove from her back forty. This is a common late
summer/early fall wildflower of old fields and other dry upland openings. Like
all members of the genus Agalinis,
this species is a hemi-parasite, meaning that it is partially parasitic on other plants. Even though it
photosynthesizes, it extracts mineral nutrients and water from the roots of its
host, usually a grass. The flowers in the photo are in bud or folding up – they
only last for one day – but are quite pretty when open.
New
visitors: Today we had quite a few visitors on a field
trip from the Georgia Connections Academy, an online alternative school.
Announcements:
Terry invited
Ramblers to join her and Kathy out at Sandy Creek Park to play on the water in
kayaks for a while, beginning at about 5:00 pm.
Today’s Reading: Our poet
laureate, Bob Ambrose, recited his latest poem, To Heal an
Epoch.
Today's
Route: We headed over to the Children’s Garden
arbor and walked the path through the Shade Garden down to the Dunson Garden. We
exited on to the road and drifted down the deer fence to the passionflower
vines. After checking them out we headed down the road to the Mimsie Lanier Center
for Native Plants. We returned to the
Visitor Center via the road.
OBSERVATIONS:
Shade
Garden:
Sasanqua camellia, a native of East Asia, is coming into flower in the Shade Garden. Its showy crown of golden stamens attracts quite a few pollinators, including honey bees and bumblebees. |
It always surprises me to find wildflowers in bloom
under a dense leaf canopy, but two natives are reliably in flower in September
in the Dunson Garden.
Ovate Catchfly, with its petals dissected into many narrow segments |
Northern Horsebalm, a mint with lemon-fragrant and lemon-colored flowers |
Deer Fence (outside Dunson Garden):
Woodland Sunflower reaching for sunlight through the deer fence along the entrance road. |
Southern Mountain-mint attracts the attention of
pollinators in two ways: with the purple spots on its flowers and with uppermost
leaves coated with white wax.
|
The fragrant flowers of Coastal Sweet Pepperbush are followed by round fruits with persistent styles |
Mulberry Weed (L) and Chamber-bitter(R) |
Two invasive exotic weeds are established along the
edges of roads throughout the Garden: Mulberry Weed with heart-shaped leaves
and Chamber-bitter with mimosa-like leaves. Chamber-bitter is also known as gripeweed,
shatterstone, and stonebreaker, just to convey how well loved it is (not). Both
are annuals from southeast Asia and produce many seeds in the late summer, so
eradication is best achieved early in the season, either by hand-pulling or
application of glyphosate. Seeds of both of these plants survive in the soil
for several years, so even one year of successful flowering and seed set can
create a long term problem in gardens.
Gulf Fritillary caterpillars on passionflower vines (several photos of cats and maypops) |
Road (between Dunson Garden and Mimsie
Center) and Mimsie Center:
Wingstem flower heads have a raggedy look, owing to the few, drooping ray flowers that surround the central dome of spreading disk flowers. |
Buttonweed’s small white flowers look like four-pointed stars scattered along the grassy paths in the powerline right-of-way. Its small, oval “button” fruits are covered with long hairs. |
The delicate but large flower/seed heads of Bigtop Love Grass are about twice as tall as those of Purple Love Grass, which blooms a little later. |
Silver Plume Grass seed heads |
Silver Plume Grass seed heads support Sorghum Webworm Moths. This moth is native to the New World tropics and north into Texas as far as New York. |
Ragweed flower spikes preparing to torment allergy-sufferers. |
Frosted Aster (Old Field Aster) |
Birders have their confusing fall warblers;
botanists have our confusing fall asters. This species is one of four
small-headed, white-flowered asters that bloom in September and October. All
four of these have spreading branches covered with a mix of many tiny and few
medium-sized leaves. This species, Frosted Aster (or Old-field Aster), has
about 30 white ray flowers and many red or yellow disk flowers. A close look at
the leaves and stems usually reveals many minute white hairs, often dense
enough to give the plant a “frosted” look. For more information on confusing fall-flowering
white asters, see pages 120-121 in Linda’s wildflower book.
Red Morning Glory (or Scarlet Creeper) is a native twining vine found in sunny habitats and open disturbed areas. The other red-flowered morning glory, Cypress Vine, is a native of New World tropics. |
Bush Katydid on the pink flower of the Seashore-mallow, a native of beach dunes and tidal marshes that also flourishes in inland gardens. |
Coral Honeysuckle flowers |
Coral Honeysuckle fruits |
Coral Honeysuckle usually flowers in April and May; these plants growing on a fence at the
Mimsie Lanier Center got a late start.
Downy Goldenrod is one of several species of goldenrod that will be on offer at the Native Plant Sale in early October. |
Joe Pye Weed inflorescences going to seed. |
Winged Sumac fruits and leaves. Notice the narrow wings of leaf tissue that seem to connect the individual leaflets to one another. |
Smooth Sumac leaves lack the wings that give Winged Sumac its name. The fruits of both Sumac species can be used to make a “lemonade.” |
Grass-leaved Golden-aster © Richard and Teresa Ware |
The
Nature Ramblers were lucky to catch Will Rogers, the Garden’s plant geneticist,
hard at work in his “common garden” experimental beds. Will explained how his
research project is comparing a rare species, Ruth’s Golden-aster (seen in the
photo near Will) with a common species, Grass-leaved Golden-aster (close-up
photo), in the same genus. By studying this species pair (and another six such
species pairs), his research team hopes to discover at least some of the
reasons why one species is rare and the other is abundant. They are looking at
the DNA of the paired species as well as conducting “common garden” experiments,
a classic method used by plant ecologists to answer this question: how much of
the difference between two species growing in different habitats is due to
environment and how much is due to genetics? Two species that grow in different
habitats are brought together into a common environment then studied to see if
they retain their differences or begin to resemble each other. The traits that
are measured include stem height, size and number of leaves, size and number of
flowers, seed set, etc.
SUMMARY OF OBSERVED SPECIES:
Agalinis purpurea
|
|
Angle-pod
Milkvine
|
Gonolobus suberosus
|
Purple
Passionflower
|
Passiflora
incarnata
|
Gulf
Fritillary (caterpillars)
|
Agraulis
vanillae
|
Sasanqua
Camellia
|
Camellia
sasanqua
|
Honeybee
|
Apis
mellifera
|
Bumblebee
|
Bombus sp.
|
Big Leaf
Magnolia
|
Magnolia
macrophylla
|
Ovate
Catchfly
|
Silene
ovata
|
Northern
Horsebalm
|
Collinsonia
canadensis
|
Woodland
Sunflower
|
Helianthus
divaricatus
|
Yellow Anise-tree
|
Illicium parviflorum
|
Southern Mountain-mint
|
Pycnanthemum
pycnanthemoides
|
Coastal
Sweet Pepperbush
|
Clethra
alnifolia
|
Mulberry
Weed
|
Fatoua
villosa
|
Chamber-bitter
|
Phyllanthus urinaria
|
Blue
Mistflower
|
Conoclinium
coelestinum
|
Virginia
Buttonweed
|
Diodia
virginiana
|
Big-top
Love Grass
|
Eragrostis
hirsuta
|
Purpletop
Grass
|
Tridens
flavus
|
Broomsedge
Bluestem
|
Andropogon
virginicus
|
Stilt Bug
|
Family
Berytidae
|
Yellow
Crownbeard
|
Verbesina
occidentalis
|
Common
Wingstem
|
Verbesina
alternifolia
|
White
Crownbeard
|
Verbesina
virginica
|
Muscadine Grape
|
Vitis rotundifolia
|
Western Camphorweed
|
Heterotheca
latifolia
|
Tall Goldenrod
|
Solidago altissimum
|
Silver
Plume Grass
|
Erianthus
alopecuroides
|
Winged
Sumax
|
Rhus
copallinum
|
Smooth
Sumac
|
Rhus
glabra
|
Common
Ragweed
|
Ambrosia
artemisiifolia
|
Frosted
Aster, Old-field Aster
|
Symphyotrichum pilosum
|
Georgia
Aster
|
Symphyotrichum
georgianum
|
Blue Curls
|
Trichostema
dichotomum
|
Grand-daddy
Longlegs
|
Order
Opiliones
|
Appalachian
Sunflower
|
Helianthus
atrorubens
|
Brazilian
Vervain
|
Verbena
brasiliensis
|
Red
Morning Glory
|
Ipomoea
coccinea
|
(Scudder’s)
Bush Katydid (nymph)
|
Scudderia
sp.
|
Coral
Honeysuckle
|
Lonicera sempervirens
|
Downy
Goldenrod
|
Solidago
petiolaris
|
Joe Pye
Weed
|
Eutrochium
fistulosum
|