Cottonwood

Cranberry Lake Park: Traveling Through Time in the “Outer Space” of Nature

/ Cam Mannino / 2 Comments
The Eastern Meadow at Cranberry Lake Park on a winter day

Will you forgive me if I take you back to February for a few minutes? Today it’s 60 degrees, the snow is melting even in the shadows and longer days remind us that the spring equinox is less than a week away. But I’d like to take you back for a few minutes to those days when, for me, walking the trails meant staring downward at icy ground to keep my footing. Calf-deep in February snow, I found myself prompted to recall a summer visitor. I took a turn toward a woodland pond and discovered a hidden world. And I saw and heard the harbingers of spring. Three snowy walks at Cranberry Lake Park lured me out into another realm for a few hours, where I mentally traveled to the past, through the present, and into the near future. So I hope you’ll strap on your mental snowshoes and join me for one last winter outing.

A cross-country skier on the Hickory Lane at Cranberry Lake Park

A Warm Memory on a Snowy Day

The trail into the park in February was a bit of a trudge one afternoon, negotiating my way among the icy footprints of visitors who’d come before me. But luckily near the first trail intersection, I looked up long enough to notice an exquisite little piece of architecture. A small, sturdy nest had been securely anchored in the upright fork of several branches of a small shrub. Though the nest was about four inches long, it was only about an inch and a half deep and about two and a half inches wide inside – a nest for a very small bird! [Click photo to enlarge.]

  • A sturdy nest woven with plant fibers and perhaps a bit of spider web in the fork of a small tree
  • The shallow cup may have originally been lined with down but nestlings and winter had worn it down to a smooth surface.

I know that Black-capped Chickadees nest in cavities rather than in cup nests out in the open. So my mind wandered back over the small cup-nesting birds I’d seen there last summer. Consulting both Cornell Ornithology Lab’s All About Birds website and my Peterson Field Guide to Eastern Birds’ Nests, I discovered that the depth of the cup was too shallow for either the Song Sparrow or Field Sparrow, which were my first guesses. But then I remembered a small spark of sunshine that frequents that corner of the park each summer, a lemon yellow visitor who arrives from the Caribbean. This nest met all the measurements my sources listed for the nest of one of my favorite warblers. The female Yellow Warbler (Setophaga petechia) is my candidate for architect of this little marvel. She needs only four days to gather materials and weave her nest of plant fibers and spider webs, lining it with plant down. If this nest is hers, it’s survived a tough winter remarkably well! It probably won’t be reused, though; most birds build a fresh nest each year. But what a warming memory of last summer! Since I’m no expert at nests, I’m open to input if any of you have a different candidate for the creator of this little nest.

A female Yellow Warbler who may have built the nest I saw this winter.

Nearby on the Hickory Lane on another afternoon, my husband and I stood admiring a very shaggy Shagbark Hickory (Carya ovata) with long shards of bark angling off its trunk. These wonderful trees can grow as high as 100 feet and can live as long as 350 years, according to Wikipedia. Shagbark Hickories reach maturity and start producing nuts at age 10. They don’t produce large numbers of them until they are 40 years old, but can continue until the ripe old age of 100. I remembered walking the lane last autumn with the crunch of hickory shells underfoot. Getting a wild hickory nut isn’t easy for us humans. They are too favored by squirrels, chipmunks, raccoons, rabbits and birds, including wild turkeys, wood ducks and mallards.

A candidate for the shaggiest Shagbark Hickory on the lane at Cranberry Lake Park

In late winter for the last few years, I’ve ventured out to Cranberry Lake on the east side of the park to see whether the Beavers (Castor canadensis) have been restocking their food stores. Some years if they have not stockpiled quite enough leafy branches thrust down inside their lodge or in ice nearby, they come out on warm winter days to add a bit more. Beavers consume the leaves and the outer layers of bark from trees, along with some rhizomes (underground stems) and other plant material stored inside the lodge when the weather was warmer. This year I remembered those pointed stumps that I noticed a few years ago and headed out to check near the lodge. But I didn’t find any newly gnawed tree stumps near the edge of the lake. So this year, the beavers’ larder must have been stocked enough to get them through this snowy season..

A beaver lodge at the edge of Cranberry Lake with branches and tree trunks for food protruding from the lodge and on or in the ice nearby.

Wintry Adventures in the Present

The trail near three connected ponds at Cranberry Lake Park

Readers may remember my fondness for imagining how tracks get left in the snow. Noticing some at the edge of the Hickory Lane conjured a possible small drama. My husband and I came across a set of mouse prints leading to a small nook created by overhanging bark at the base of a tree. The tracks were blurry and seemed to be going in two directions. I wondered if perhaps a White-footed Mouse (Peromyscus leucopus) had scooted across the trail, turned back for a moment, spotted a potential threat and dashed toward this hiding place again. In any case, its tracks back out of the nook looked to be at a more normal pace, leaving tiny leaping footprints and tail marks in the snow. Of course this is all guesswork on my part. If you have another interpretation, please share it in the comments!

  • Hurried mouse tracks heading to shelter at the base of a tree.
  • The mouse seemed to have exited at a slower pace.

During the January walk with the birding group, a few of us ventured out onto the ice of a small pond along a trail that we take back toward the parking lot. I keep an eye on this pond in the summer because it’s frequented by Wood Ducks regularly and sometimes by Great Blue Herons as well. But on this trip, the ice was plenty thick enough to permit me to explore a bit further afield.

The northern section of the hidden pond where I look for Wood Ducks during the spring and summer

Doing what a friend calls “boot skating,” I slipped across the ice to find a vantage point from the middle of the northern part of the pond. Instead of the narrowed strip of water I’d peeked at from the forest in the summer, a second large section of the pond expanded out before me!

The second section of the hidden pond with a small outlet far at the left.

Dr. Ben VanderWeide, our township stewardship manager, brought up a map of this area on his cellphone to show me that this pond actually had three sections, the farthest south connected to the others by a narrow stretch of water. I was instantly intrigued! After six years of hiking here, I was seeing something that I hadn’t know existed!

The ponds within the trail loop at Cranberry Lake Park

I couldn’t investigate that morning but my husband Reg and I returned several days later to begin exploring these unseen sections of the pond. What fun to shuffle and slip across the icy surface! Near the eastern edge of the pond, a giant tip-up loomed at the water’s edge. It turned out to be the combined roots of 3 tall trees that had been uprooted by a strong wind at some point in the past. I’d never seen a tip-up this big before!

My husband Reg near the three tree tip-up at the edge of the hidden pond’s second section.

Nearby, an old Black Willow (Salix nigra) slanted up out of the soil at a precarious angle. The roots appear to have been alive last year since a whole series of suckers protruded from the tree’s surface. But it was the amazing pattern of the aging bark that fascinated me, like the wrinkled skin of an ancient face.

An elderly Black Willow with wonderfully wrinkled bark

Moving south, we arrived at the narrow outlet that led to the third part of the pond.

The narrow outlet between the second and third sections of the pond

Stepping out of the narrow, tree-lined passageway, I felt a little thrill, as if I were entering a small, hidden world all its own. There was nothing spectacular about this shallower third pond really, except that it seemed more isolated , fringed with forest and farther from the trails that I normally take in and out of the park – a secret place ripe for discovery.

The third section of the hidden pond, surrounded by wetland and woods

We walked tentatively around the ice because it looked softer, perhaps shallower, and the edges gave way to water underfoot. I wondered if the pond would disappear in summer heat, sinking back into the wetland that lay around and beyond it. In warmer weather, it will be more challenging to reach this pond through dense trees, shrubs, tall grass and the mud that will surround it – but I hope to try.

We left by gingerly stepping from clump to clump of Tussock Sedges (Carex stricta) at the western edge of the pond. Sedges can look like grasses, but their triangular stems are different from the hollow, round stems of grasses. During the summer, the two-foot stems of Tussock Sedge produce seeds which, when carried by the wind, end up feeding Northern Cardinals, Wild Turkeys, Mallards and those Wood Ducks that I see in the spring.

Tussock Sedge produces wind-carried seeds that feed many species of birds. Photo by Frank Mayfield at inaturalist.org (CC BY-NC)

They also spread vegetatively into colonies through rhizomes. As the leaves wither, they drop onto the live plant below forming what look like plump, brown cushions during the winter.

The tall stems of Tussock Sedge fall onto the living plant below when they die, adding to the clumps that spread into colonies through underground rhizomes.

Looking Forward to Spring and Beyond

Two harbingers of spring greeted me on the way back to the parking lot last month. Despite the snow, the buds on a Silver Maple tree (Acer saccharinum) along the path were already swelling.

Silver Maple buds swelling as spring approaches

And nearby two male Northern Cardinals (Cardinalis cardinalis) participated in a singing competition, probably establishing their territories. One was perched off in the distance in a marsh, but the one near the trail paused his singing and posed for a moment.

One of the two cardinals announcing their territories by countersinging at Cranberry Lake Nature Park

Here’s an older recording I took of two cardinals doing the same thing.

The Tussock Sedges near the third hidden pond are host plants for the caterpillars of three butterflies: the Eyed Brown (Satyrodes eurydice), the Black Dash (Euphyes conspicua), and the Dun Skipper (Euphyes vestris). I’ll be looking for them next summer nectaring on native wetland wildflowers and shrubs like Swamp Milkweed, Button Bush or Joe Pye, though some also get nutrition from bird droppings or tree sap. Knowing who might be there makes going next summer even more inviting!

  • Eyed Brown butterfly by Bonnie Kinder (CC BY-NC) inaturalist.org
  • Black Dash butterfly by Jeremy Collison (CC BY-NC) inaturalist.org
  • Dun Skipper by Mark Eanes (CC BY) inaturalist.org
  • Joe Pye (Eutrochium maculatum)
  • Swamp Milkweed (Asclepias incarnata)
  • Button Bush (Cephalanthus occidentalis)
The butterflies whose caterpillars need Tussock Sedge and three wildflowers on which the adults seek nectar

The Thrill of Discovery in Another Realm

A massive “mackerel” cloud above the Eastern Meadow at Cranberry Lake Park

My friends will tell you that I’m fascinated by the new rover that landed on Mars recently. Watching the NASA video of the Perseverance robot being lowered to the surface or listening to the recording of the wind blowing on Mars completely delights and fascinates me. But really, we have a largely unknown world available to us right outside our doors. When I step into a new environment like the hidden pond at Cranberry Lake Park, I’m in another realm, too – a wild one very different from my human habitat. And that immediately delights and engages me. I wonder “What grows here and what part does it play in this habitat? Which creatures make their homes here in the summer months? Which birds will nest in this secret wetland out of sight from the trails? Could I find an active Yellow Warbler nest near the pond next summer now that I’ve learned to recognize one? What can I discover that I’ve never before seen, or if seen, not noticed?”

Maybe the impulse that drives NASA researchers to Mars is, in some small way, the same impulse that pushes me out the door on a snowy day to see what I can discover. For a few hours, I leave behind the warm, safe, enclosed human realm to experience the wildness of the other realm that surrounds me. In this nearby “outer space,” trees, wildflowers and grasses thrust themselves out of the ground, using sun, water and earth to grow and reproduce. In the cold, heat, rain and wind, wild creatures scurry, soar, leap, run, crawl and swim day and night year ’round. And when I leave their world behind and arrive back in my human one, I feel awake and alive. Thanks for traveling to nature’s “outer space” with me. I love having you along to share what I’m learning.

Watershed Ridge Park: Virtual Hike #2 in a Pathless Park

/ Cam Mannino / Leave a comment

Welcome back to Watershed Ridge Park for our second virtual hike through this as yet pathless 170 acre park.  (If you missed the first hike, click here.) This week’s exploration will take us to the western area of the park, which is a little easier to explore than the east.  Starting in 2016, Dr. Ben VanderWeide, our township natural areas stewardship manager, started habitat restoration in old farm fields which had grown into thickets of invasive shrubs. Forestry mowing eliminated the standing shrubs, and follow-up treatment and brush mowing  knocked back the invasive plants and shrubs in this area of Watershed Ridge. He then sowed in some wonderful native plants, including grasses which add a golden sheen right now to the upland slopes in the west of the park, as you’ll see a bit further into our walk.

WRP_AerialMap_Hikes2

Aerial map of Watershed Ridge in 2017. Hikes 1 in yellow. Hike 2 in red.

Photos and text
by Cam Mannino

Starting from the parking lot on W. Buell Road (A), we’ll walk along the grassy edge (B) between two fields and head back into the woods to pay a visit to a pond full of singing frogs (C). Emerging from the woodland edge, we’ll enter a big, wild meadow that slopes to a small marsh (D). We’ll follow the forest stream from last week’s hike that burbles its way out of the large marsh to the park’s northeast (H).   It meanders from marsh to marsh before exiting under Lake George Road (E). Our return will take through the western farm fields (F,G) and back to the parking lot. So please, lace up your virtual boots and join me!

The Woods Filled with Frog Song!

As I headed out of the parking lot to the north one afternoon, a Northern Cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis) advised me from deep in a tangle of vines,  to “Cheer up! Cheer up! Cheer up!”  (Listen to the Cardinal under “Duet” at Cornell Lab.)

A Northern Cardinal amid a tangle of branches at Watershed Ridge.

Feeling even better than I did when I arrived – thanks to his greeting – I headed toward the woods north of the field to my right. Halfway there I realized that the ice had melted in the wetlands since my last visit, because I heard…frog song!

A wetland full of singing Wood Frogs at Watershed Ridge.

Arriving at the muddy edge of the pool, I spotted the concentric ripples that I was looking for. At the center of each was a Wood Frog (Lithobates sylvaticus). Wood Frogs spend the winter frozen solid under a log or in leaf litter. Miraculously, they thaw out as the weather warms and rush to nearby water to mate. Imagine how good it felt for this little frog to be stretched out floating at the surface on a spring day. The one below was just beginning to kick and recreate the ripples around him.

When mating, Wood Frogs float on the surface of the water and make a chuckling call to each other.

The whole throng of amorous Wood Frogs floated with their legs extended and kicked their back legs occasionally which kept the concentric circles ripping outward. Vernal pools tend to dry in warm, summer weather so the frogs start to mate quickly in early spring. They benefit from the absence of fish in vernal pools who might make a nice meal of the frogs’ eggs if they were present. Throughout the process of my observations, Wood Frogs make a throaty chuckling sound, as if they are as amused as I am by the whole spectacle.

Out of the Woods and Into the Big Meadow!

The big sloping, meadow that appears as you step out of the woods has been in the process of restoration for several years. Now in early spring, the meadow is sere, brownish gold and easy to traverse since winter snow tamped down last year’s stalks and new growth has barely begun. The marsh at the bottom of the slope (D) is edged in scarlet stands of Red Osier (Cornus sericea). This wetland is fed by the stream that runs out of the much larger marsh (H)  in the northeast section of the park.

Pano Meadow at WR (3)

The sloping Big Meadow in golden hues on a spring day.

In the summer, the Big Meadow is a challenging hike because the native grasses and wildflowers can grow waist-to-shoulder high. A view of the water is even more obscured in warm weather when the shrubs that surround the marsh leaf out. But what a glorious sight the meadow is on a summer day! Butterflies, dragonflies, and summer birds flutter, zip and soar above its changing summer palette of emerging wildflowers.

Ben’s panorama of the Big Meadow in August of 2017.

The Dry Uplands of the Big Meadow and Water Meandering Out of the Marsh

The upland slopes of the Big Meadow seeded during restoration with native Virginia Wild Rye

What’s loveliest about the uplands of the Big Meadow right now is the golden glow of large stands of Virginia Wild Rye (Elymus virginicus), a native grass that the stewardship crew seeded onto these graceful slopes.

Virginia Wild Rye , a native grass, sown by our stewardship crew as part of restoring the west side of the park.

The uplands of the Big Meadow are dotted by a variety of trees.  One of my new favorites has three different common names: Hop-hornbeam, Ironwood or Musclewood (Ostrya virginiana).  I love the latter because doesn’t the wood look like a muscular arm?

The trunk tells me why one common name for this tree is Musclewood.

I came across something in the uplands that I hadn’t seen before and didn’t initially identify. It think it was a deer rub, a spot on a tree where a deer has rubbed the area between its forehead and antlers. The sweat glands there will deposit a scent during the annual rut in order to “communicate a challenge to other male deer,” as Wikipedia puts it. The bark certainly looks like it’s been torn upward from below. If a naturalist or  hunter has any other idea about  how this shredded bark happened, though, please educate me!

What I think is a deer rub on a tree at the edge of the woods.

On a visit to the uplands on a sunny day in early March, I was surprised to find a patch of orange, gilled mushrooms. Mushrooms when the ice had barely started to clear from the marshes? My helpful friends at the Mushroom Identification Facebook page identified them for me as Flammulina velutipes, commonly called Winter Mushroom. According to the website fungusfactfriday, “it particularly likes warm spells in the winter and cold snaps during other seasons.” Though it’s theoretically edible, it’s evidently easily confused with a highly toxic mushroom called Gallerina marginata. So unless you are an expert, don’t try these if they show up on your own property.  And please don’t pick any mushrooms in our parks; they are a food source for squirrels and other animals. I found more detailed information on these fungi at a  University of Wisconsin website.

Winter Mushrooms at Watershed Ridge Park are theoretically edible but easily confused with another highly toxic one – so beware! And please don’t pick mushrooms in our parks.

Down near the marsh, the stream that found its way from the large northeast marsh moves on. It runs west at the bottom of the meadow, leaving a soft muddy surface perfect for the earliest of spring wildflowers, Skunk Cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus). These strange,  pungent blossoms rise just above the mud; the stems remain below. This ancient and almost alien-looking flower produces temperatures from 27-63 °F, which assists the plant’s reproduction in a couple ways. The heat melts the snow around the emerging mottled hood (spathe). Early pollinators – flies and some bees – are attracted to the carrion-like smell which the heat carries out of the plant. The plant also provides them with a warm refuge from the cold – and while inside, the insects pollinate the flowers on the spike (spadix). Skunk cabbages are an ancient plant and live a long time because their roots contract each year, pulling the stems deeper into the soil. So as Wikipedia notes, ” in effect [skunk cabbage} grows downward, not upward”!  How’s that for an amazing feature!

Skunk cabbage blossoms and perhaps the emergence of their big green leaves?The stems grow underground.  Year after year the roots contract and pull them deeper into the soil.

Before long the flowers will wither, but huge green leaves will emerge, using photosynthesis to provide the energy for the underground growth. Here’s what the leaves looked like at a wetland in Bear Creek a few years ago.

As the blossom withers, the green leaves emerge to feed underground growth.

Near the edge of the marsh, a deer had met its end, probably serving to feed the coyote pups or the adults that I heard in the eastern woods last week. Not being a hunter, I’d never looked closely at deer teeth before. These were accompanied by a skull and some ribs; no doubt both the coyotes and the crows had picked them clean. A strange, melancholy sight, but then deer are so over abundant here that I don’t begrudge the coyotes a good meal at the end of a long winter.

A skull, ribs and these strange teeth tell of a coyote foraging for its family near the marsh.

The stream keeps flowing west toward Lake George Road through a drainage ditch excavated by a farmer at some point in the past. Leaving the meadow, it carves its way into the woods, creating mini-ravines that I needed to navigate in order to keep exploring. Along the edge of these ditches, trees have adapted in a variety of odd ways, like the snail-shaped tree (right below). Some of this flow, Ben says, will be strategically plugged in upcoming wetland restoration work, and in some wet parts of the western farm fields small berms will be placed to slow down water running off the fields, allowing the water to recreate the shallow ponds and saturated soil of years ago.  [Click to enlarge; hover cursor for captions.}

Eventually, the water finds its way into a small marsh right at the edge of Lake George Road (E on the map), between W. Buell and Stony Creek Roads. On the left is the view of the marsh from Lake George Road, the way I’ve seen it since childhood when I rode my bike past it. On the right is the view I finally got after 60 years or so – looking east from the wooded slope of  Watershed Ridge Park toward the road. A fun moment for me.

Looking east toward the small marsh from Lake George Road
Looking west from the woods inside the park across the small marsh

The stream runs under Lake George Road, taking a turn as it flows west toward Paint Creek. And in the shallows, multiple blossoms of Skunk Cabbage popped up like small bouquets from the muddy soil. A fine spring display!

Skunk cabbage cropping up within the stream as it flows past Lake George Road

Heading Back through Steeply Rolling Farm Fields

Wetland, farm field and woods – three basic elements of Watershed Ridge Park

Stepping out of the woods, into a farm field in the west of the park (F), I carefully negotiated my path across a small stream and around a little wetland, when I saw a small brown bird sail into some shrubs nearby. It turned out to be a returning  Song Sparrow (Melospiza melodia); you can discern the spot at the center of its striped upper breast. This may have been a tired male scouting territory, since it wasn’t singing its spring song of several bouncy notes followed by a trill. Cornell Lab of Ornithology recordings demonstrate that Song Sparrows in other parts of the country sing somewhat different versions of the spring song. So I guess some birds have “dialects,” too!

A Song Sparrow’s field marks are a striped upper breast with a dark spot at the center.

This is one of the fields that the Ben hopes to slowly restore with the prairie plants that were here before European settlement. Wet areas and steep slopes that erode when tilled to expose bare soil will be planted with deep-rooted native grasses and wildflowers. Prairie plants provide food and cover for all kinds of birds and butterflies so those sloping hills will be not only a gorgeous sight,  but productive as habitat. Portions of the western fields and the big fields on the east side of the park, however, will continue to be farmed.

A beautifully shaped Eastern Cottonwood Tree (Populus deltoides) graces the edge of this field if you walk up the tree line – or if you see it at a distance as you head north from the parking lot. I love the delicate tracery of the branches now and wonder if it will look as beautiful to me once it’s leafed out. I’ll let you know.

The beautiful architecture of a Cottonwood Tree at one edge of a farm field at Watershed Ridge.

In the field nearest the road intersection (G), a small wetland provides a good spot to look for birds.  One shiny, late afternoon,  my husband and I spotted a crouching Killdeer within the glare off the water. I think it must have been a loner without a nest  yet, since it didn’t immediately fly away, keening its high-pitched call over the fields. 

The Killdeer was hard to see amidst the glitter of late afternoon sun – which seemed fine with bird who stayed perfectly still.

After stumbling into the open through some feet-snagging brambles between fields on another day, I startled a solitary Mallard (Anas platyrhynchos) who’d settled peacefully on the little pond.

A Mallard lifts off from the small vernal pool in the corner of the field at Buell and Lake George.

And farther up the hill, I missed getting a photo of two Sandhill Cranes that must have been feeding there. Frustrating! But then, overhead, a Cooper’s Hawk sailed right above me and I just managed to get my camera pointed upward in time! A lovely compensation for scaring off three beautiful birds!

And with that lovely finale, I headed back to my car.

Nature’s Uncomplicated Generosity

A daytime moon over a farmed field at Watershed Ridge Park.

Thanks for traveling with me this week and last at Watershed Ridge Park. I still want to explore the eastern woods, but I’ll probably wait until drier weather to find my way around the large wetland there. And I’m anxious to see if the deer have left any woodland wildflowers in those moist woods. So perhaps May will be a time for Virtual Hike #3 at Watershed Ridge. We’ll see.

The moon over the field seems to be taking an afternoon nap with its cheek resting on a pillow of blue sky.

A friend of many years recently wrote that lovely phrase “nature’s uncomplicated generosity” when describing the solace of the wild. She let me borrow it here because it expresses two qualities I always appreciate when under a big sky – especially one with a sleepy moon in it! Wildness exists purely in the present moment; it doesn’t regret the past or anticipate the future. It just is. When we venture into nature, it offers itself to our senses with no real effort and yet is generous enough to sustain a continuous flow of experiences. For the hours I’m out exploring, my attention is drawn from one detail to the next, crowding out all the noisy thoughts that normally push me through the day. If you can get out in the fresh air in any way during this self-enforced exile, please do. Putter in your early spring garden, let a breeze cool your cheeks near an open window or outside your back door. Or during this solitary time, hike on the path that poet Robert Frost eventually chose, the one “less traveled by.” I think you’ll find, as I do, that it can make “all the difference.”

Paint Creek Trail: Last Hurrah of Spring Wildflowers, Tiny Pollinators and Nesting Migrators

/ Cam Mannino / Leave a comment

Since this week’s blog features a variety of wildflowers along parts of the Paint Creek Trail, I thought we’d start with a little visit to the creek itself, which is currently overflowing its banks. The Swamp Buttercup certainly seems pleased with all that moisture! (If you increase your volume, you can listen to the soothing sound of flowing water and birdsong!)

Well, with summer heat settling in, native spring flowers are producing a glorious finale to the season before making room for summer blooms. Spring wildflowers love the weaker spring sun sifting through bare branches. But hot sun and the increasing number of leaves mark the end of spring blooms. Soon these wildflowers will set their fruits, send it to the ground by means of wind, water or simple gravity, and their seed-based reproductive efforts will come to an end for the season.

Text and photos
by Cam Mannino

So before they’re all gone, here are the ones I saw last week on the Paint Creek Trail between Gallagher Road and Dutton Road. You may still be able to spy some of these native beauties as you walk or bike on a sunny afternoon for the next few days.

Discoveries on the Trail between Gallagher and Silver Bell Roads

Golden Alexanders make a sunny yellow blanket beneath the trees just south of the Wet Prairie between Gallagher and Silverbell.

Golden Alexanders (Zizia aurea – above) should still be glowing beneath the light shade of trees near the Wet Prairie after Memorial Day. These members of the carrot family are visited by many spring pollinators, but they can also also self-pollinate. You can see them near the parking lot on Gallagher Road and at other spots along the trail as well.

In the Wet Prairie, a more unusual little wildflower is happily sprouting where the sun is full and the ground is moist. Blue-eyed Grass (Sisyrinchium angustifolium) is really a wildflower, though its leaves look like grass. Best to look for these dainty flowers on a sunny day, since the flowers stay closed on cloudy days.

Blue-eyed Grass on the Wet Prairie is best seen on sunny days.

Another unusual little wildflower huddles under its much taller grass-like stem on the Wet Prairie. Star Grass (Hypoxis hirsuta) shines up out of prairie on a 6 inch stalk topped by a small (3/4 inch) blossom. The six stamens with their angular anthers add to its star-like appearance. Maybe the dew on the leaf in the photo will help you sense the size of this tiny jewel of a wildflower.

Star Grass in the Wet Meadow with dew on a nearby grass leaf

Near the creek, just north of the Wet Prairie, a burst of orange caught my eye and I discovered a native flower that was new to me, Golden Ragwort (Packera aurea).  This plant too has multiple methods of reproduction.  Each of the tiny florets that make up the protruding center of the flower will produce an achene, a winged fruit enveloping a single seed that will disperse into the wind. But ragwort also produces underground stems (rhizomes) aid its spread!

Golden Ragwort brightens the bank edge of Paint Creek near the Wet Prairie

A native, fire-adapted plant which was new to me has the unusual name Bastard Toadflax (Comandra umbellata) and this is not a flax or a toadflax plant.  A report on desertusa.com, claims it was named “toadflax” by the 16th century botanist, John Gerard, because the flowers “be yellow, having a mouth unto a frog’s mouth” and “bastard” because at the time meant “false,” indicating perhaps that it was not a real toadflax. This interesting prairie plant is “hemiparasitic” because it feeds through its roots, but also taps into roots of other plants to get nutrition and water using special structures called haustoria. Bastard toadflax reproduces by rhizomes and produces a small oily fruits enjoyed by birds and mice, who by eating them carry the seeds farther afield.

Bastard Toadflax puts out underground suckers that tap into the roots of other plants.

If you notice a splash of white far back in the Wet Prairie, it might be a patch of  Robin’s Plantain (Erigeron pulchellus), a tough, little native that thrives after prescribed burns. It’s a relative of Daisy Fleabane (Erigeron annuus), a common wildflower in our parks. Unlike Daisy Fleabane, though, Robin’s Plantain more commonly produces one bloom to a stem. Like the Golden Ragwort, it reproduces by both achenes and rhizomes.

Robin’s Plantain, a relative of the more common Daisy Fleabane. Both thrive after prescribed burns.

Early last week, the fluffy, white blossoms of native Choke Cherry (Prunus virginiana) hung  in long clusters along single stems called racemes. After warmer sun later in the week, they had begun to turn yellow. They don’t produce edible cherries, but their bitter fruit appeals to game birds, songbirds and woodpeckers, according to one of my favorite wildflower sites, www.illinoiswildflowers.info.

Choke Cherry trees/shrubs don’t produce edible cherries, but rather a bitter fruit that appeals to birds, but not humans. But their blossoms are beautiful!

All long the trail you’ll see Wild Strawberry (Fragaria virginiana) blooming. Now here’s one bloom you might love to see fading, because its ripening fruit is tiny, but delicious. Good luck getting them before the birds and beasts do, though!

When Wild Strawberry blooms fade, on comes the fruit. But you’ll be lucky to get it before the creatures do.

Discoveries on the Trail from Silver Bell Road to Dutton Road

Despite our late spring, many different native wildflowers were blooming along this section of the trail.  At the bottom of the stairs leading to the creek, just past the parking area, Swamp Marigolds (Ranunculus hispidus) shine bright despite the deep shade. As you saw in the video at the top of the blog, the wetlands along the stream are doing what they do best – soaking up the runoff after heavy rains. And Marsh Marigold is doing its part!

 Farther down the trail, the lavender spikes of Wild Lupine (Lupinus perennis) are blooming. This beloved native produces seedpods open explosively, launching seeds up to seven feet from the plant. Lupine also produces colorful clones as it spreads with rhizomes. Lupines are rising toward the sun in several parks as part of the restoration work being done on our prairies. It’s so heartening to see these lavender blossoms opening up from bottom to top on their stately racemes. And I love the whimsy of its wheel-shaped leaves.

Both the leaves and blossoms of Wild Lupine make it a treasured native wildflower.

Along the berms on the western side of the trail, a perky yellow flower blossoms in bunches. The fuzzy stems and leaves give it the first part of its name, Hoary Puccoon (Lithospermum canescens). According to Wikipedia, the second word “puccoon” comes from an ancient Native American word “poughkone,” and refers to plants formerly used for dyes by Native Americans. I wonder if its roots can turn things that vivid yellow/orange?

The roots of Hoary Puccoon were used by Native Americans for dye. But please don’t pick them to try this at home!

Near the first bridge going south, I found a whole group of native wildflowers that were just finishing their blooms. A small group of Common Trillium (Trillium grandiflorum) still stood in the shade just off the trail. These flamboyant white flowers start turning pink as they age, eventually leaving only their leaves behind to gather up more sun for next years flowers. While true pink- and red-flowering trillium species exist, our Common Trillium just turn pink as they age gracefully.

A Common Trillium also germinates after multiple seasons in the soil.
It begins to turn pink as it fades.
Eventually, as it wilts for the season, it turns a deeper pink.

Nearby Starry False Solomon’s Seal  (Maianthemum stellatum) bore only a rather disheveled version of its star-shaped blossom. After the blossoms, the plant will produce green fruits with purple/black stripes that eventually turn red. Woodland birds and mice enjoy the fruits, thereby carrying the seeds within the berries to new locations.

Starry False Solomon’s Seal has graceful leaves as well as tiny star-shaped flowers.

Native Bees and Tiny Butterflies Busy Pollinating

This may be a Mining Bee, a native pollinator, which specializes in Wild Geraniums.

Many spring wildflowers depend heavily on flies and native bees (of which there are 450 Michigan species!) for their pollination, because many other butterflies and the honey bees finish migrating or emerge from hives only in warmer months. Above is what I think is a native Mining Bee (Andrenidae family) foraging for pollen and thereby pollinating one Wild Geranium (Geranium maculatum) after another! I’m not knowledgeable about bees, but I learned from Pollinators of Native Plants that a particular Mining Bee, Adrena distans, is a specialist pollinator of Wild Geranium, so that’s my guess. Please feel free to correct me if you know more about bees than I do!

A few tiny butterflies were doing their part in pollinating flowers as well. If you see a fluttering wink of blue among the grass stems, it’s probably a Spring Azure butterfly (Celastrina Ladon). These 1 inch pollinators are blue when flying but once they settle, they quickly fold their wings so only the dull gray side shows. It makes them hard for hungry birds – and interested photographers! – to spot. Azures tend to pollinate Golden Alexanders, False Solomon Seal as well as other wildflowers. (Photo on the left by iNaturalist. org photographer Dan Mullen.)

Spring Azure blue upper wings by Dan Mullen (CC BY-NC-ND)
The Spring Azure is much less notable to predators when it settles to feed.

The tiny Pearl Crescent (Phyciodes tharos) quickly fluttered by me and landed on dry grass stems in the Wet Prairie. These little butterflies produce several broods of caterpillars throughout the summer. So watch for tiny (up to 1.25 in.) flashes of orange and black rising from the grass and scurrying across trails all summer long, busily sipping nectar and inadvertently transporting pollen for the flowers.

The tiny Pearl Crescent can be seen now at the Wet Prairie and all summer long in our parks.

The last little butterfly was in a perfect spot to find a mate.  According to http://www.butterfliesandmoths.org, “To seek females, males perch in openings, flats or depressions near woods.” And that’s right where this one was – in the open, on a dead plant stalk near the trees just south of the Wet Prairie. He’s not glamorous but he has a glamorous name, the Dreamy Duskywing (Erynnis icelus). (Duskywings can be hard to tell apart, so again, feel free to correct me!) [Edit:  A man who collects butterflies and has seen many Duskywings told me on Facebook that he believes this is a Sleepy Duskywing (Erynnis brizo)  which he says are more common in this area.} He’s picked a great spot since one of his favorite nectars is the nearby wild lupine. These duskywings like to lay eggs on aspens and cottonwoods, which surround the Wet Prairie.

Possibly a Sleepy Duskywing  waiting on an open perch to be found by a mate.

Migrators Building Nests and, What Else? – Singing!

Late spring is a busy time for birds.  Some have just arrived and are busy singing to attract mates. A Warbling Vireo (Vireo gilvus) sang over my head in one of the Quaking Aspens (Populus tremuloides) near the Wet Prairie. This vireo is rarely seen once the leaves come on the trees; they like to stay high in the treetops and search diligently for caterpillars. But hearing a quick, rolling song high above me, I spotted his vireo shape, gray/olive back and yellow-ish white belly from below. Then he disappeared into the tree canopy. So here’s a photo of one I saw at Cranberry Lake a week ago. Click here to listen to his rollicking warble!

A Warbling Vireo sang above my head near the Wet Prairie. An illusive bird high in the trees with a great song!

The Warbling Vireo near the trail seemed quite frantic, singing insistently and hopping higher and higher in the tree as he did so. At first I thought another male vireo was singing across the trail from him – and I believe that he thought so too! But when I followed the other song, it was one of the great bird mimics, the Gray Catbird (Dumetella carolinensis), doing an imitation of the Vireo’s song and, I think,  driving him crazy! The Catbird was, as usual, adding a few flourishes of his own, but it seemed as though the Vireo found his call an annoying form of competition! For a sample of the Catbird’s wonderfully complex, mimicking song, click on the word “Song” at this link.

The Catbird’s mimicry of the Warbling Vireo’s song seemed to fool the vireo into thinking he had competition!

A pair of Baltimore Orioles (Icterus galbula) swooped down onto the Wet Prairie one afternoon. The female immediately disappeared into tall grass. It’s likely that she was carefully choosing grass stems out of which she could strip fibers for weaving her long, sack of a nest. Evidently, the male’s job was to stand guard while she had her head down.

A male Baltimore Oriole stands guard while his mate searches for just the right plant fibers to weave her bag-like nest.

Suddenly, the female oriole lifted out of the grass, followed immediately by the male, and they swooped into a tall Cottonwood (Populus deltoides) on the northern side of the prairie. She disappeared into a clump of leaves hanging high over the meadow, but I could see the branches moving as she worked and a tiny bit of the growing nest  (look in the center of the photo below through the leaves). I found a great little YouTube video of the Oriole’s weaving process, which is really incredible. Imagine tying knots and twirling fibers around a branch using only your beak!

The beginnings of an oriole nest high over the Wet Meadow

I heard a pair of  Eastern Kingbirds (Tyrannus tyrannus) fluttering together from tree to tree and stopped to watch. After giving what sounded like greeting calls, they soared up into a tall tree near the Wet Meadow. The female stood at the edge of a very messy nest which she was constructing on top of what appeared to be an old squirrel nest. The male doesn’t help build the nest, so while she worked, he stood guard in a nearby tree. I read in the Stokes Guide to Bird Behavior (Vol. 1) that Kingbirds build preliminary nests before settling into a final one to lay eggs. I’m guessing this may be just a trial nest, since building on a squirrel nest seems like an iffy location! (Squirrels are known to eat bird eggs!) The fine fibers drooping down over the top of the squirrel’s dry, gray branches and leaves are the female kingbird’s doing.

A female Eastern Kingbird seems to be constructing a preliminary nest on top of an old squirrel nest.

Kingbirds are identifiable from a distance by their upright posture – what one member of the birding group calls their “military stance.” And note the white tips on the tail feathers.

The male Eastern Kingbird stands guard while the female works on her nest

Every Nature Walk has its Special Moments

Last week, I had to smile at this seemingly relaxed male Northern Cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis). He hopped slowly up and down a slope by the trail, picking up and rejecting items he found between the grass stems. With the grass taller than his head and his red crest (which is usually erect) drooping backwards, he reminded me of an avian Red Riding Hood!

It’s little things like that – and seeing the Blue-eyed Grass staring up at me – or watching the two Eastern Kingbirds near their nest – that send me home happy from every foray into the natural world. And these grant adventures only require the right clothes for the weather, water-proof shoes, a little application of bug spray at times and my undivided attention for an hour or so. I usually take my camera along,  but walks without anything but my trusty binoculars are just as rewarding. If you ever feel a bit weary as the poet Wordsworth once did, “The world is too much with us, late and soon/Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers…,” try a foray into our parks with your curiosity set at high alert. I’m confident that nature will send you home refreshed and with moments to share with others. Thanks for sharing mine!

Footnote: My sources for information, besides Oakland Township's Stewardship Manager Ben VanderWeide, are as follows: Caterpillars of Eastern North America by David L. Wagner; inaturalist.org;Allaboutbirds.org, the website of the Cornell Ornithology Lab at Cornell University; Wikipedia; Herbarium of the University of Michigan at michiganflora.net; various Michigan Field Guides by Stan Tekiela;Butterflies of Michigan Field Guide by Jaret C. Daniels,  A Guide to Bird Behavior Vols.1-3 by Donald W and Lillian Q.Stokes, Pollinators of Native Plants by Heather Holm,and others as cited in the text.