Leader for today's Ramble: Linda, Emily
Link to Don's Facebook album for this Ramble, All the photos in this post are compliments of Don Hunter, unless otherwise credited.
Number of Ramblers today: 28
Reading: Emily read the entry for September 6th in Donald Culross Peattie's "An Almanac for Moderns".
ACR0SS the boggy bit of meadow, and over the lawn rolling gently to the water's edge, every blade of grass, every inch of space, is covered with a fall of gossamer. It is like the foam upon the sea, like the spray in the air from a mountain waterfall. Millions and millions of threads finer than silk gleam with millions of dew drops like spangles. These are the looms, it was believed in older, simpler days, where are woven the sheer cloth with which fairy women clothe their tiny seductive bodies.
Why is it that a fall of gossamer is almost always seen in autumn? The best authorities seem agreed that at the turn of the year the spider population, like almost all the animal folk, reaches its height. The moment comes when each species has bred and reared, and every inch of its environment is filled. At such times butterflies, locusts, crows, grackles, lemmings and spiders too are moved by some inner emotion that makes them wish to see the world. This is not so much a migration with any fixed goal, but a general exodus, preceded by a swarming. From every bush and blade and hole the spiders sail off upon a thread spun out of themselves. They launch themselves upon a course that is light as air, fluid as liquid, evanescent as a thought.
There is no evidence that the spiders will arrive anywhere save at that bourne where we must all arrive. They must die in the frost and the lake; they must starve in some alien meadow, half a copse away from home. [bourne = destination]
Why is it that a fall of gossamer is almost always seen in autumn? The best authorities seem agreed that at the turn of the year the spider population, like almost all the animal folk, reaches its height. The moment comes when each species has bred and reared, and every inch of its environment is filled. At such times butterflies, locusts, crows, grackles, lemmings and spiders too are moved by some inner emotion that makes them wish to see the world. This is not so much a migration with any fixed goal, but a general exodus, preceded by a swarming. From every bush and blade and hole the spiders sail off upon a thread spun out of themselves. They launch themselves upon a course that is light as air, fluid as liquid, evanescent as a thought.
There is no evidence that the spiders will arrive anywhere save at that bourne where we must all arrive. They must die in the frost and the lake; they must starve in some alien meadow, half a copse away from home. [bourne = destination]
Show and Tell:
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| Richard's skeletonized American Elm leaf. |
Richard brought some skeletonized American Elm leaves, wondering what causes this kind of damage. The folks at Colorado State University Extension Service tell us that "Elm leaf beetles (Xanthogaleruca luteola) are common insects that chew leaves of elm trees. The dark grub-like larvae chew on the underside of leaves but avoid the larger leaf veins, producing a type of injury pattern known as skeletonizing. Leaves damaged by elm leaf beetle larvae look lacy, turn brown and may prematurely drop from the tree." https://extension.colostate.edu/topic-areas/insects/elm-leaf-beetles-5-521-2/
Anne shared a bough from a Sweet Shrub, with dried fruit.
Announcements/Interesting Things to Note:
Georgia Audubon Society is having a native plant sale
https://www.georgiaaudubon.org/plant-sales.html
https://www.georgiaaudubon.org/plant-sales.html
Several Ramblers shared notice of availability of Pfizer and Moderna vaccine boosters at several local pharmacies, including CVS and Hawthorne Drugs. Some require you be immune-comprimised, others may require you to wait the current guideline of 8 months after the second shot.
Today's Route: We took the mulched path (White Trail Spur) below the Children's Garden and headed down to the ROW. We turned right on the ROW up towards the road, then reversed, and followed the ROW to the river. Then back up the ROW to the road, stopping at the Passionflower vines on the deer fence at the Dunson Garden before we returned, through the Shade Garden, to the Visitor Center.
LIST OF OBSERVATIONS:
Pergola (aka: Arbor):
" Sue pointed out a Yellow Mealworm Beetle larva that was moving in the grout channels between the red paver bricks.
White Trail Spur:
" The fallen stalk of Jack-in-the-Pulpit brings the fruits within eating distance of ground-dwelling birds such as Wood Thrush and Wild Turkey. Each fruit is about ¼ inch long, and fleshy, filled with seeds ultimately excreted by birds. The rest of the plant, especially the underground parts, contains needle-like crystals of calcium oxalate that puncture the membranes of the mouth, throat, and digestive tract inflicting severe pain and swelling. With such a defense system, how did this plant earn the alternate common name of Indian Turnip? Apparently, Native Americans learned that cooking or drying the plant would break down the crystals and render them harmless.
Carrot-footed Lepidella is like a "typical" amanita: a rounded, scaly cap and the bulbous foot emerging from the leaf litter.
Pergola (aka: Arbor):
" Sue pointed out a Yellow Mealworm Beetle larva that was moving in the grout channels between the red paver bricks.
White Trail Spur:
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| Heather identified an Orchard Orbweaver to the right of the path, holding station in the center of its round orb. It differs from typical Orchard Orbweavers in several ways, though: Legs are banded, not solid color, the orb center has capture threads, and the spider is sitting back up, not belly up. |
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| Golden-gilled Gerronema |
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| Cranefly Orchid stalk with elegantly drooping fruits. |
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| Cluster of Jack-in-the-Pulpit fruits. |
" The fallen stalk of Jack-in-the-Pulpit brings the fruits within eating distance of ground-dwelling birds such as Wood Thrush and Wild Turkey. Each fruit is about ¼ inch long, and fleshy, filled with seeds ultimately excreted by birds. The rest of the plant, especially the underground parts, contains needle-like crystals of calcium oxalate that puncture the membranes of the mouth, throat, and digestive tract inflicting severe pain and swelling. With such a defense system, how did this plant earn the alternate common name of Indian Turnip? Apparently, Native Americans learned that cooking or drying the plant would break down the crystals and render them harmless.
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| Carrot-footed Lepidella |
Carrot-footed Lepidella is like a "typical" amanita: a rounded, scaly cap and the bulbous foot emerging from the leaf litter.
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| Oak-loving Gymnopus |
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| Ringless Honey Fungus. |
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| Smooth Chanterelle mushroom |
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| Southern Grape Fern with fertile frond rising well above the sterile frond. |
ROW, including short section of in-the-open White Trail Spur exiting the woods:
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| Rough-leaf Sunflower |
Rough-leaf Sunflower, with its bright yellow flower heads and sandpaper-rough leaves, led the parade of today's right-of-way wildflowers.
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| White Crownbeard |
White Crownbeard, aka Frostweed, have become extremely abundant in the right-of-way and found throughout the right-of-way prairies from the floodplain to the top of the ridge in the Elaine Nash Prairie Project.
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| Tall Thistle |
Tall Thistle raises its spiny heads above the surrounding vegetation. This native species is distinguished by its late summer flowering time, moderately spiny leaf margins, and white, lower leaf surface. The invasive Musk Thistle, Carduus nutans, blooms in late spring and early summer, has intensely spiny leaves, and green lower leaf surfaces.
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| Cloudless Sulphur caterpillar on Senna flowers Wikimedia Commons; File:Cloudless_Sulphur_Caterpillar_on_Cassia_Bloom.jpg |
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| Maryland Wild Senna seed pods |
Maryland Wild Senna flowers look amazingly similar to the caterpillar of the Cloudless Giant Sulphur Butterfly, Phoebis sennae, one of the butterflies that use this species as a larval host. The other color form of the caterpillar is green and looks like a senna seed pod. Or does the seed pod look like the caterpillar?
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| Tall Ironweed |
Tall Ironweed, 12+ feet and with purple florets, is the most glamorous of our late summer wildflowers.
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| Yellow Crownbeard |
Yellow Crownbeard flower heads always look raggedy and beat-up. Each head has five or fewer petal-like ray flowers surrounding the collection of spreading disk flowers. Its leaves are opposite and, like other members of this genus, its stems are winged.
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| Carolina Horsenettle |
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| Carolina Horsenettle being buzz pollinated. |
The yellow, banana-shaped anthers of Carolina Horsenettle are tipped with tiny pores. Native bees, especially bumblebees, grasp the anther with their forelegs and rapidly vibrate their thorax muscles, shaking the anther so fiercely that pollen emerges from the pore. Most of the pollen is gathered into the bee's pollen baskets but some is smeared onto the bee's body and, ideally, transferred to other flowers. "Buzz pollination" may seem like an inefficient method of pollen dispersal, but this mechanism is found in at least 60 different plant families world-wide.
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| Wolf Spider |
Heather collected a small Wolf Spider for us to look at, That pair of large eyes makes them excellent hunters, just like their namesakes.
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| Spittlebug foam "nest" |
Spittlebug foam masses could be seen nestled in the leaf axils of many different plant species throughout the ROW. Each spittle drop conceals one spittlebug nymph. The nymph produces the spittle, a mixture of air, plant sap and nymph poo.
Spittlebugs are related to cicadas and aphids.
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| Spiny Amaranth |
Spiny Amaranth (aka Spiny Pigweed) is native to tropical America, is a rapidly spreading weed.
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| Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly basking high in a Tall Ironweed plant. |
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| False Nettle |
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| False Nettle flowers |
As a member of the nettle family, Urticaceae, False Nettle is actually a "true" nettle, but it lacks the stinging hairs. Its flowers and fruits are located in small, round clusters strung like beads along stalks that arise from the base of leaf stalks.
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| Dodder |
Dodder is a parasite-it lacks leaves and its stems are orange, with no chlorophyll with which to conduct photosynthesis. A Dodder plant starts out life rooted in the ground, but once it reaches another plant it severs the ground connection and begins to twine around its new host. Then, by sinking root-like pegs, called haustoria, into the stems of its host, Dodder extracts water, carbohydrates, and minerals. It flowers abundantly, producing white, five-lobed blooms in dense clusters.
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| Short-winged Green Grasshopper |
Heather collected several more insects for us to look at, including a short, stubby Short-winged Green Grasshopper (above) and a small ground cricket Neonemobius sp. (below).
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| Small Ground Cricket |
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| Reed Canary Grass seedhead |
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| Reed Canary Grass joint |
Reed Canary Grass, seen here in the ROW for the first time. This is a problematic species, invasive in many parts of the world. Genetic studies indicate that North American populations include some plants that are cultivars introduced as ornamentals from Europe and some plants that are native. It can form huge monocultures in wetlands.
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| guttation |
This damp morning, leaves in the floodplain are sparkling with dew as well as moisture exuded from within the plant from pores along leaf edges, a process known as guttation that is driven by a build-up of water pressure in the body of the plant.
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| Dotted Smartweed |
Dotted Smartweed, with small, white flowers growing along the length of the slender plant stems. Close examination with a 10x hand lens is required to see the "dots" - tiny pits or depressions in the surface of the flowers.
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| Chinese Praying Mantis |
Heather noticed a large Chinese Mantis in the tall vegetation close to the edge of the ROW.
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| Blooming Passionflower vines playing host to Dodder. |
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| Virginia Tiger Moth caterpillars will be quite common in the ROW for much of the rest of the summer, liking the sunflowers and wingstems. |
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| Ramblers by the Canebreak |
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| Chinese Yam among the canebreak. |
Ramblers gathered under Tall Ironweed at the canebrake. We were dismayed to find that Chinese Yam had invaded the canebrake, its aerial tubers a sure sign of infestation by this very invasive species. The tubers sprout roots and stems (the tiny buds can be seen on the tubers in Don's photo) to form new plants. The plants also spread by seed, forming dense thickets that eventually smother other plants. It was introduced to this country as a food and medicinal plant and was recognized as a pest plant in the mid-1990s.
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| Common Wingstem flower heads |
Common Wingstem (aka Alternate-leaved Wingstem) in flower. Its flower heads resemble those of Yellow Crownbeard which has opposite leaves. Patches of this plant are found throughout the ROW.
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| American Groundnut |
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| Small
White Morning Glory vines are all along the edges of the
ROW. Other color variants, e.g.,purple or pink, are also found. |
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| Ground Ivy |
SUMMARY OF OBSERVED SPECIES:
Yellow Mealworm Beetle (larva) Tenebrio molitor
Orchard Orbweaver Leucauge venusta ??
Golden-gilled Gerronema Gerronema strombodes
Carrot-footed Lepidella Amanita deucipes
Cranefly Orchid (seed pods) Tipularia discolor
Jack-in-the-pulpit Arisaema triphyllum
Ebony Spleenwort Asplenium platyneuron
Oak-loving Gymnopus Gymnopus dryophilus
Ringless Honey Fungus Desamirillaria tabescens
Southern Grape Fern Botrychium biternatum (synonym Sceptridium biternatum)
Silverbell Halesia tetraptera
Smooth Chanterelle Cantharellus lateritius
Rough Sunflower Helianthus strumosus
White Crownbeard Verbesina virginica
Tall Thistle Cirsium altissimum
Maryland Wild Senna Senna marilandica
Tall Ironweed Vernonia gigantea
Yellow Crownbeard Verbesina occidentalis
Carolina Horsenettle Solanum carolinense
Common Eastern Bumble Bee Bombus impatiens
Wolf Spider Family Lycosidae
Virgins's Bower Clematis Clematis virginiana
Spittlebug (Nymph) Superfamily Cercopoidea
Milkvine Matelea or Gonolubs sp.
Spiny Amaranth Amaranthus spinosus
Eastern Tiger Swallowtail Papilio glaucus
False Nettle Boehmeria cylindrica
Dodder Cuscuta sp.
Short-winged Green Grasshopper Dichromorpha viridis
Small ground cricket Neonemobius sp.
Reed Canary Grass Phalaris arundinacea
Multi-flora Rose Rosa multifora
Dotted Smartweed Persicaria punctata
Chinese Mantis Tenodera sinensis
Purple Passionflower Passiflora incarnata
Yellow Garden Spider Argiope aurantia
Virginia Tiger Moth (caterpillar) Spilosoma virginica
Chinese Yam Dioscorea polystachya
River Cane Arundinaria gigantea
Common Wingstem Verbesina alternifolia
American Groundnut Apios americana
Small White Morning Glory Ipomoea lacunosa
Ground Ivy Glechoma hederacea
