Ramble Report May 2, 2024

 Leader for today's Ramble: Linda

Authors of today’s Ramble report: Linda. Comments, edits, and suggestions for the report can be sent to Linda at Lchafin (at) uga.edu.

Insect identifications: Heather Larkin, Bill Sheehan

Fungi and gall identifications: Bill Sheehan

All the photos that appear in this report, unless otherwise credited, were taken by Heather Larkin. Photos may be enlarged by clicking them with a mouse or tapping on your screen.

Number of Ramblers today: 29

Today's emphasis: Seeking what we found in the Children’s, International, and Threatened & Endangered Species gardens.

Reading: Linda read a poem about the passing of spring by Byron Herbert Reece from his 1950 book, Bow Down in Jericho. Byron Herbert Reece was born, and lived his life, in Union County, Georgia. This piece in the New Georgia Encyclopedia tells you more about Reece's life and poetry.

We Could Wish Them a Longer Stay

Plum, peach, apple, and pear
And the service tree on the hill
Unfold blossom and leaf.
From them comes scented air
As the brotherly petals spill.
Their tenure is bright and brief.
We could wish them a longer stay,
We could wish them a charmed bough
On a hill untouched by the flow
Of consuming time; but they
Are lovelier, dearer now
Because they are soon to go,
Plum, peach, apple and pear
And the service blooms whiter than snow.

Show and Tell:

Roger C. brought some deceased cicadas of the 13-year brood – note the distinctive red eyes on the adult at the top of the photo; the shed exoskeleton of a nymph is below. Roger's and Betsy’s home in Oglethorpe County is in the middle of a local cicada colony. Roger said, “For the past week the woods around us have been filled all day with their incessant buzzing – like the sound track to a horror movie. I am surprised to go somewhere like the Botanical Garden and not hear them.”

Linda pointed out the American Wisteria blooming overhead on the Children's Garden Arbor.

Many ramblers remember the Children’s Garden Arbor when it was known as The Wisteria Arbor, and was laden with old, heavy Chinese Wisteria vines that flowered like crazy every April. In fact, it was the cover photo for a 2001 book about the Botanical Garden by Hugh and Carol Nourse, two of the leaders of the original group of Nature Ramblers in 2009. With increased awareness of the invasiveness of this species, and with the vines threatening to overrun the nearby woods, they were removed when the Children’s Garden was installed and the arbor re-built. A single vine of our native American Wisteria was planted on the northwest corner and is slowly spreading. Mostly found in the riverine swamps of south Georgia, American Wisteria is occasionally found in gardens in north Georgia. If you see a Wisteria growing north of the Fall Line you can bet it’s the Chinese species – feel free to kill it!

American Wisteria flowers are not fragrant like the Asian species, but are more intensely colored.

Announcements and other interesting things to note:
Gary Grossman, Professor Emeritus of Animal Ecology at UGA, has written a beautiful essay about fishes and rivers in the Southern Appalachians. Gary will be leading a river ecology ramble this fall along the Middle Oconee River.

“The Cicadas Are Here, Singing a Song for the Future,” an essay in the New York Times by Margaret Renkl.

“Sunken Treasure: The Art & Science of Coral Reefs” exhibit of rare books and coral specimens collected by Jim Porter is still on display at the Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library on North Campus. Jim leads tours of the exhibit every first Friday at 2:00 pm through July 5. Jim is also leading a special tour for Ramblers on Thursday morning, June 27, when we will meet him at the library at 9:00am.

Today's Route:  We exited the Children’s Garden along the south side near the Callaway Building, entered the International Garden where we visited the bog garden, the Threatened and Endangered Species garden, and the Pawpaw patch.

OBSERVATIONS:

Yellow- and blue-flowered Wild Indigo species are in bloom at the Garden and elsewhere in Athens in native plant gardens. Their spectacular flower spikes make both of these species easy-to-love natives. The yellow-flowered species above is the result of a hybrid between Yellow Wild Indigo and White Indigo called 'Carolina Moonlight.' The blue-flowered plants below are Tall Blue Wild Indigo. The Wild Indigo genus Baptisia has received a lot of horticultural attention in the last 20 years and there are now several hybrids and cultivars on the market.

There are about 25 species of Wild Indigo in the eastern half of North America, the only place on the planet where this species occurs. The Wild Indigo genus, Baptisia, was called “False Indigo” in the past since these plants are not in the same genus as the dye-producing indigo of the tropics. But they are not “false” anything, so we ackowledge their North American nativity with the common name of Wild Indigo. (One Baptisia species, B. tinctoria, has been used as a dye plant.) For information on growing Wild Indigo, click here and here.

Like many other species in the Bean Family (Fabaceae, pronounced fab – ā – see - ee), most Wild Indigo leaves are trifoliate, i.e. there are three leaflets per leaf. (There are a couple of notable exceptions that we’ll see in flower in the summer.)

Pea type of bean family flower

Wild Indigo plants have classic Bean Family flowers, with an upright banner petal and two wing petals enclosing a keel petal. Only large pollinators such as bumblebees can pollinate these flowers – their weight presses down on the keel petal, exposing the stamens and pistil hidden within. There are two other types of Bean Family flowers, the Mimosa type and the Senna type, but the classic Pea flower type is by far the most common in this family.

Mimosa type of bean flowers – a cluster of many tiny flowers with long showy stamens

Senna type of bean flowers with five nearly identical petals. Maryland Senna grows in the right-of-way and we'll see it in flower this summer.
Photo credit.

A large bed of ‘Extracta’ Garden Sage is in full flower and attracting Western Honeybees in the Children’s Garden. Both are European species and the flowers are a nice fit for the bees – no nectar robbing is required to reach the nectar at the base of the flower tube. ‘Extrakta’ Garden Sage is a cultivar of Common Sage, a European native long used for medicine and cooking. The species name, Salvia officinalis, refers to the storeroom, the officina, in monasteries where dried herbs were stored and medicines were crafted. Below, a Western Honeybeee is visiting a Garden Sage flower.

Calico Beardtongue, a native species of Penstemon, also attracts honeybees.

Green-and-Gold is still flowering in the Children’s Garden

When we entered the International Garden, we were awed by three large flowering shrubs/small trees from Eurasia, a pink-flowering Deutzia, a white-flowering Deutzia, and an Asian Smoketree.

Deutzia is a Eurasian genus in the Witch Hazel Family.
Deutzia × 'Monzia' Pink-A-Boo®

White-flowered Fuzzy Deutzia

Eurasian Smoketree

A native species of American Smoketree is very similar in appearance, producing the same clouds of pink "smoke." It occurs on rocky limestone slopes on the Cumberland Plateau of northwest Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, and Kentucky, and west to Missouri and Arkansas. It is rare throughout its range. The name Smoketree comes from clusters of long, pink hairs on the spent flower stalks that persist for months. Its fall leaf color is considered to be the best of any native shrub.

 

Heather spotted this nearly invisible cluster of newly hatched Tuft-legged Orbweaver spiders in a delicate net of silk.

We headed to the bog in search of pitcherplant flowers and their inflated, insect-capturing leaves. Sadly, most of the leaves we found were phyllodes – the flat, sword-shaped leaves that pitcherplants produce when there is insufficient sunlight. 
 

One Yellow Trumpet Pitcherplant had fully expanded leaves with a victim, a Click Beetle, on its way to becoming a nitrogen source (below).

How Pitcherplants Work

Decaying insect bodies inside a pitcherplant leaf
Photo by Don Hunter

Insects are attracted by sweet smelling nectar produced around the top rim of the pitcher and, if they fall in, are prevented from escaping by downward pointing hairs or slippery surfaces. Once trapped in the bottom of the pitcher, their bodies are digested by enzymes produced by bacteria that live in the pitcher, as well as those produced by the plant. In fact, pitcherplant pitchers support a suite of creatures that depend on them for shelter and food, including some that are found nowhere else but those pitchers, a wonderful example of symbiosis. Both plant and bacteria depend on this insect soup for nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus. Wetland soils, where pitcherplants live, are always low in available nitrogen, and pitcherplants, sundews, butterworts, and bladderworts make up for this lack with their carnivorous lifestyle.

Parrot Pitcherplant flower
photo by Don Hunter

Pitcherplant flowers are strange looking – the petals droop down, the sepals arch widely over them, and the pistil and stamens are hidden away under… an upside-down umbrella? In typical flowers, the pistil is a small structure, held at the center of the flower, consisting of an ovary, a style (a small column on top of the ovary), and a sticky, pollen-receptive stigma at the top of the style. In pitcherplants, the style is expanded into the upside down umbrella and the stigmas are notches on the tips of the umbrella’s “ribs.” The combination of drooping petals and the upside-down umbrella ensure that insects who have entered into the flower looking for nectar or pollen are trapped long enough to bumble around among the stamens, accidentally picking up pollen which they may carry to the next pitcherplant's flowers. (For more detail on pitcherplant pollination, see this article from the Harvard Forest website.)

Early last fall, the gnarly twigs and branches of this Northern Prickly-ash (aka Northern Toothache Tree) in the Physic Garden were bare, stripped of their leaves by the hungry caterpillars of Giant Swallowtails. The tree seems to have fully recovered, and is fully leafed out with a new crop of leaves waiting for this year's cats. Giant Swallowtails use only plants in the Citrus family (Rutaceae) as larval hosts, including shrubs such as this species as well as the coastal Southern Toothache Tree (Southern Prickly Ash or Hercules’ Club, Zanthoxylum clava-herculis) and Wafer-ash (Ptelea trifoliata), a shrub of calcareous soils.

Pawpaws are in flower.

White-marked Tussock Moth caterpillar making its way along the railing in the Pawpaw patch. The four pale bumps on its back are dense “tussocks” of stinging hairs on the first four abdominal segments. They feed on the leaves of oaks, Black Cherry, Hackberry, and willows. More info on this species is here.

The Threatened and Endangered Species beds are overwhelmed with Indian Pink, in glorious flower, this year! I would like to nominate "Firecracker Flower" as a new common name for this species that is neither Indian nor pink, but explodes with color.

Heather noticed this spider  – yes, it’s a spider!  – on an Indian Pink leaf. It’s an Ant-mimicking Jumping Spider. Ant mimicry is fairly common, having evolved more than 70 times. Some insects mimic ants to discourage predation (ants are usually unpalatable), others to lure their predators in so they can then turn and attack them.

Cooley’s Meadowrue is one of the rarest plant species in Georgia, and is both state and federally listed as endangered. Eight populations have been documented in Georgia, but only one is protected on conservation land. Georgia's populations differ from North Carolina and Florida plants in several ways and may represent a new species, endemic to Georgia.

Leaving the native plants of the T&E garden behind, ramblers emerged into the China Section just in time to catch the Voodoo Lily in full flower, its spadix besieged by flies. Flies and beetles are attracted by the rotten meat appearance of the spathe and the disgusting odor of the spadix. The Voodoo Lily is definitely not a member of the Lily Family but belongs in the Arum Family (Araceae), familiar to us as other spathe-and-spadix flowers such as Jack-in-the-Pulpit (in the woods) and Peace Lily (possibly seen in a planter at a shopping mall near you).

Voodoo Lily flower with its speckled spathe and brown, columnar spadix. The yellow patch at the base of the spadix is a cluster of tiny flowers. Zoom in to this photo – you can see the flies swarming both the spadix and spathe. Heather, who took this closeup photo and got out as fast as she could, testified to the overwhelming awfulness of the smell.

During cool, damp springs such as we’ve had this year, Camellia Leaf Galls may develop on the leaves of Camellias, turning them thick, fleshy, and bright green. Over time, the galls become dry and powdery, as above, releasing spores that will infect the plants again next spring. The galls are created by a fungus, Exobasidium camelliae, found mainly on Sasanqua Camellias.

Bill spotted two Flannel Moth chrysalids on twigs of a Swamp Chestnut Oak.

Flannel Moth chrysalis

The adult Flannel Moth is aptly named.
Photo by Judy Gallagher

Heather found a Carolina Wren’s nest (below) with four chicks in a drain pipe.
Photo by Bill Sheehan

SUMMARY OF OBSERVED SPECIES:
Thirteen-year Cicada             Magicicada sp.
American Wisteria                 Wisteria frutescens
Tall Blue Wild Indigo              Baptisia australis
Yellow Wild Indigo × White Indigo 'Carolina Moonlight' Baptisia sphaerocarpa X B. alba
Calico Beardtongue, Long-sepal Beardtongue          Penstemon calycosus
‘Extracta’ Garden Sage        Salvia officinalis
Green-and-Gold                    Chrysogonum virginianum
Fuzzy Deutzia                        Deutzia scabra
Pink Deutzia                          Deutzia × 'Monzia' Pink-A-Boo®
American Smoketree           Cotinus obovatus
Tuft-legged Orbweaver Spider      Mangora placida
Yellow Trumpet Pitcherplant         Sarracenia flava
Click Beetle                            Family Elateridae
Parrot Pitcherplant               Sarracenia psittacina
Northern Prickly-ash (aka Northern Toothache Tree)  
                                                Zanthoxylum americanum
Tall Pawpaw                            Asimina triloba
White-marked Tussock Moth caterpillar  Orgyia leucostigma
Indian Pink                                         Spigelia marilandica
Slender Ant-mimic Jumping Spider          Synemosyna formica
Cooley’s Meadowrue                     Thalictrum cooleyi
Voodoo Lily                                    Sauromatum venosum
Camellia Leaf Gall                         Exobasidium camelliae
Southern Flannel Moth               Megalopyge opercularis
Carolina Wren                              Thryothorus ludovicianus