Ramble Report October 17 2019

Today's Ramble was led by Don Hunter.

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 Don Hunter.

Today’s Focus:  Fungi in the Dunson Native Flora Garden and along the Blue Trail

18 Ramblers today

Announcement (added 10/23): Linda says: I'm back from five days in Suches, where it was COLD! I found a funny card from the ramblers with lots of sweet notes in my mail box. Please add to the blog my thanks for the card and good wishes. I look forward to seeing everyone soon!

Reading: Don read from the first two pages of Chapter XII, Autumn, in Frances Theodora Parson’s “According to Season”:

            On every perfect day, Nature, like a beautiful woman, cajoles her true lovers into the belief that she has never before worn so becoming a dress.  I have a conviction of long standing that the world is fairest when the trees are first laced with green, and little tender things are pushing up everywhere and bursting into miracles of delicate bloom.  Yet, with each heaven-born morning of the succeeding seasons, this somewhat spasmodic faith is weakly surrendered.  It is impossible to wonder at Lowell’s

                                 “What is so rare as a day in June?”

When the lanes are first lined with white-flowered shrubs, and the air is heavy with fragrance and alive with bird-voices.  Later, without one backward glance, I abandon myself to the ripe, luscious beauty of midsummer.  And though, while taking my first fall walk the other day (for the true fall is not here till well on in September), and while noting now the hills were veiled by a silvery mist, and how the road sides wore a many-hued embroidery, and that the sumach in the swamp was beginning to look like the burning bush on Horeb, I felt that there could be no beauty like this, which foretold the end; yet already I realize that before long the purple shadows will lie so softly upon the snowy fields, and the faint rose of dawn or twilight will flush with such tenderness the white side of the mountain, that the earth may seem lovelier in her shroud than in any of her living garments.

            But it is altogether human to set especial value upon the things of which we are about to be deprived, and now, more than ever, we linger out of doors, yielding ourselves to influences which lie upon our spirits like a benediction, storing our minds with images which, among less inspiring surroundings, will

                    “flash upon that inward eye, which is the bliss of solitude.”

Few flowers are abroad, barring the asters and golden-rods, yet these few we invest with a peculiar interest and affection, experiencing a sensation of gratitude, almost, as toward some beings who have stood stanch when the multitudes fell away.

Today's Route:   We left the arbor in the Children’s Garden, via the Shade Garden path to the right of the arbor and walked down to the Dunson Native Flora Garden.  We made our way through the Dunson Garden leaving by the lower gates and heading down the ROW towards the river.  At the location of the old fence and gate (just recently removed, BTW) we turned right and headed into the floodplain woods, following the faint trace of an old access road.  As we neared the gate at the Mimsie Center, we climbed the bank to head through the gate and into the Mimsie Center.  We found the gate locked and the walkthrough gate no longer functional due to a poorly selected sign location, so we then headed up through the woods to the Blue Trail.  We took a right on the Blue Trail and took it for a distance until we were passing above the meadow where the Torreya Pines used to be located.  At this point we headed down across the little meadow to get back on the gravel road.  From here we walked back up the paved road to the Visitor Center, where many of us retired to the Café Botanica for some refreshments and conversation.

Narrative of Observations:

Shade Garden:

Walking through the Shade Garden, we stopped briefly to look at the Mayapple sculpture. We had noticed it earlier in the season but stopped to look at the dedication plaque, placed during the recent dedication. We then headed to the Dunson Native Flora Garden.

Dunson Garden:

 

Jack-o-Lantern mushrooms

Jack-o-Lantern mushroom showing the gilled underside of the cap.

Terrestrial planarian

Our first stop in the Dunson Garden was to check out a nice little flush of Jack-o-Lantern mushrooms.  These are fleshy mushrooms, orange in color, with gilled caps atop a lighter orange, fibrous stipe.  Jack-o-Lanterns are poisonous but not to a fatal degree.  If ingested, they will make one sick for several days.  Jack-o-Lantern poisoning is a reality as they are sometimes badly mistaken by novice foragers for chanterelles.  While at the Jack-o-Lantern stop, Brown found a shiny terrestrial planarian flatworm on a dried leaf.  We passed it around for all to see.

Wood Ear mushroom

We then headed down through the Dunson Garden, following the mulched paths high on the hillside, to several dead and sectioned hardwood trees.  We saw many large Oyster mushrooms, as well as some faded Violet Toothed Polypore mushrooms.  We continued to work our way back down to the lower paths, seeing Wood Ear fungus, False Turkey Tails, more Violet Toothed Polypores and some Mustard Yellow Polypores.

Golden Ragwort with leaf mines

While in the Dunson Garden we stopped to look at the Golden Ragwort foliage, still as green as when they appeared six months ago in early spring.  We checked out a few nice leaf miner trails, commonly seen on the Golden Ragwort foliage.

Another source of the current, pervasive green in the Dunson Garden at this time of year is the many Eastern Leatherwood shrubs seen throughout the lower half of the Dunson Garden.  I demonstrated the source of the name leatherwood at several examples by bending the supple twig ends all the way back on themselves, showing the extreme flexibility of the twigs and mentioned that Native Americans used the Leatherwood twigs for thongs and footwear straps, among other things.

Silverbell fruits

We also stopped by the Common Silverbell tree to check out the four-parted fruits, now dark brown.  The scientific name Halesia tetraptera comes from the four-parted fruits.

Blue Mist flower

Coming out in the lower Dunson Garden, we spent a few minutes with the Longleaf Pine, which seems to have really taken off in the last several years.  It appears much taller now than even last year.  (I would assume it is still in it’s “rocket” stage of growth.)  Blue Mist flower is now very abundant and in full bloom, adding a lot of blue color to this part of the garden.

ROW:

Tall Ironweed

Leaving the Dunson Garden, we walked down the mown paths in the ROW, mainly taking note of how, in just the past few weeks, most of the tall flowering plants (Wingstem, Yellow Crownbeard, White Crownbeard, Tall Goldenrod and Tall Ironweed) have now gone to seed and the foliage is browning.

Floodplain Woods, between ROW and Mimsie Center:

Dotted Smartweed

We took a right at the location of the old deer fence and gate and headed through the woods.  As we were approaching the Mimsie Center gate, we began to walk through a large area thick with grassy looking Dotted Smartweed.  Many of the plants were still in flower and much of the grassy vegetation had begun to turn red.  Camphorweed (P. camphorata) was spotted along the way. 

Stately Maiden Fern

Exiting the woods, several nice clumps of Stately Maiden Fern could be found, some that were producing spores.  A few rather fresh looking blooms were seen on wingstem growing along the edge of the woods.

Blue Trail:

Black Cherry mature bark

Finding the gate locked and the pedestrian gate blocked by a sign, we headed on up the hill towards the Blue Trail.  As we hit the Blue Trail, I saw a mature Black Cherry, with nice “smushed, burnt potato chip” bark, and instantly thought of Emily.  At this point, Avis mentioned the terraces we had crossed as we walked up the hillside from the Mimsie Center gate and we discussed their origins in early cotton farming on the property and the fact that the woods through which we were walking were what is considered a successional forest, with very few large, older trees.  We then walked down the Blue Trail to where two large hardwoods had fallen across the trail.  The centers, where the trees lay over the trail, had been removed to allow passage, and the dead trees on either side of the trail were supporting large numbers of a variety of mushrooms. 

Oyster mushroom showing the gilled undersurface.

Mustard Yellow Polypore

 

Violet-toothed Polypore

Seen here at this stop were:  Oysters, Violet Toothed Polypores, Turkey Tails, False Turkey Tails and Mustard Yellow Polypores.  One of the Nature Ramblers attempted a tree ring count and indicated that the tree was at least 80 years old, but possibly as old as 100 years.

Dunson Garden Deer Fence:

Gulf Fritillary caterpillar

On the way heading up the road to the Visitor Center, we stopped to check the Passionflower vines for Gulf Fritillary caterpillars.  On the lone remaining semi-robust section of vines we saw four or five caterpillars, of varying sizes.  As with past observations this season, no chrysalises were observed hanging from the fence.

 SUMMARY OF OBSERVED SPECIES:

Jack-o-Lantern mushroom	Omphalotus illudens
Terrestrial Planarian	Bipalium kewense
Oyster Mushrooms	Pleurotus ostreatus
Violet-Toothed Polypores	Trichaptum biforme
Wood Ears	Auricularia sp.
Turkey Tail	Trametes versicolor
False Turkey Tail	Stereum ostrea
Mustard Yellow Polypore	Fuscoporia gilva
Golden Ragwort	Packera aurea
Eastern Leatherwood	Dirca palustris
Common Silverbells	Halesia tetraptera
Longleaf Pine	Pinus palustris
Blue Mist Flower	Conoclinium coelestinum
Wingstem	Verbesina alternifolia
Yellow Crownbeard	Verbesina occidentalis
White Crownbeard	Verbesina virginica
Tall Goldenrod	Solidago altissima
Tall Ironweed	Vernonia gigantea
Dotted Smartweed	Persicaria punctata (= Polygonum punctata)
Camphorweed	Pluchea camphorata
Stately Maiden Fern (???)	Thelypteria kunthii
Black Cherry	Prunus serotina
Purple Passionflower	Passiflora incarnata
Gulf Fritillary	Agraulis vanillae