October in the Woods

Nodding Ladies' Tresses ( Spiranthes cernua)

                                My favorite bog flower!  And she bloomed like crazy this fall.

Purple Beautyberry ( Calicarpa americana)

Last year the Beautyberries did not set fruit - yea, they are such a lovely color!

Ground Sel Tree ( Baccharis Halimfolia))

Have you noticed the white fluffy bushes/trees that appear along the roadside in the fall?
Well, this is it.  And we wanted one, and one just appeared in the Rose Garden - God is good!!

FALL COLORS

Winterberry Holly / Red Sprite (Ilex verticillata)
She is beginning to show her winter colors, later her leaves
will drop and the bare branches will sport bright red berries.

Wild Ageratum ( Eupatorium coelestinum)
Unlike its "tame" relative, this lovely plant is 2-3 feet in height,
is a perennial and is said to be invasive - we certainly hope so!

The Dry Season, Answer to Prayer, and yet more in The Woods

This has been a very difficult summer for us all, Burlington seems to be in a magic ( bad) place relative to passing storms - they go to our north, they go to our south, they pass to our east and our west, but rarely, since June have we hit the jackpot.  As a result, we have been having to water regularly and heavily - an acre+ of woodland is not an easy thing to keep hydrated, and our "new babies" are particularly vulnerable. Last night we received almost 1/2" of rain - a blessing!  And in The Woods, the beat goes on - more lovely plants coming to bloom:

Virgin's Bower Clematis virginiana

White Beautyberry  Calicarpa americana v lattea
a first bloom for this shrub - berries??

Tricky Trillium

Follow this link for a very delightful and informative video produced by the New England Wildflower Society.  It is most interesting!

http://www.newenglandwild.org/publications-and-media/video/tricky-trillium-3d-animation.html

White trillium Trillium grandiflora

Crane Fly Orchids

Tipularia discolor   Crane Fly Orchid

This intriguing little plant has captured our curiosity.  We first became aware of it in July of 2009, our first month working in Sullivan Woods, while cleaning up dead fall and poison ivy.  Sandy Kerbow spotted a couple of bloom stalks.  You can imagine the excitement when we found out we had "orchids in our woods".  That alone made our entire effort worthwhile, the preservation of wild orchids!

Crane Fly Orchid
-photo by Linda Lafferty

Crane Fly Orchid leaves
-photo by Bob Herbert

By late September all that remained of our orchids was a happy memory and a dry bloom stalk, but what is this emerging at many locations in the Woods - delightful little magenta leaves all over the place!
They are the leaves of the Crane Fly orchid, they remain all winter, disappearing in May.  In late June, the bloom stalks reappear, first as a tiny magenta nose, peaking through the leaf litter.
Only a very few of the leaf colonies produced bloom stalks - here comes the curosity part:
We excavated 3 of the leaves: a small one, a larger one and one with a bloom stalk associated with it.
Our supposition was correct, the bloom stalk had a much larger root complex than the other two.

As an aside, the excavated orchid bloomed again this summer!
-photo by Bob Herbert

Now the next question:  If a root blooms this year, will it bloom next year as well.  In the summer of 2010 we marked 5 of our bloom stalks, three of them rebloomed this year.  Today, we marked 32 new bloom locations.  Why do we have this explosion of orchids?  Not that we are complaining of course, but why? and will it continue?  We think we may, in irrigating the Woods, have created a more favorable environment, or maybe our population is maturing? 

Today we marked 35 bloom sites
-photo by Linda Lafferty

It looks just like we wanted it to!

Lobelia siphilitica and cardinalis
Red and Blue Lobelia in the foreground
-photo by Linda Lafferty

Everytime we go to the woods we find something new!

For those wishing to find these fine fellows in Sullivan Woods, the Sundew is in the bog, the Purple Passionflower is growing up the "tepee" at the end of Dogwood trail, the Yellow Passionflower is growing up the large tree at the end of the driveway leading to the generator enclosure, and the Pinesap is growing in the area of the exercise equipment on the east side and is marked by white flags.

A close view of the sundew (Drosera)
-photo by Linda Lafferty

Purple Passionflower  (Passiflora incarnata)
-photo by Linda Lafferty

Yellow Passionflower ( Passiflora lutea)
-photo by Linda Lafferty

Pinesap (Monotropa hypopithys)
-photo by Linda Lafferty

This is a very unusual looking plant ( rare or endangered if Wikopedia is to be believed) it is not a fungus, but rather an herbaceous plant without chlorophyll, thought to live off fungus.

165 New Babies are prepared for Sullivan planting in the fall

First you have to mix the potting soil, then fill the pots.

These seeds were sown back in February ( see Feb 26 post), some spent time in our refrigerators to simulate winter before being put in our backyard nurseries.

These will live in our nurseries until fall, when the weather moderates.

Reference: April 9, 2011

- photo by Bob Herbert
Boy, did we have tadpoles, and those that matured into frogs are, of course, enjoying sitting on the lily pads.
Isn't that what frogs are supposed to do?
"There's a little green frog swimming in the water,
A little green frog doing what he oughter.
He jumped right off of the lily pad,
That the little duck bit and he said "I'm glad;
I'm a little green frog swimming in the water,
Ribbit! Ribbit! Ribbit"
Do you remember that Burl Ives song? 

The Pond



Nymphaea odorata
Native Water Lily



Pontederia Cordata
Pickerel Weed



The bog

Sea Pink

Did you know that
The Venus Flytrap
blooms?




                                      
                                                                                                        

The Meadow in June

                                   As we had hoped, the meadow is a constantly changing pallet.

New Bridge and Blooms

Thanks to the carpentry and hard work of  Bob Herbert and his able assistants Fae Herbert and John Morin we have a new and safer bridge crossing Sullivan Brook.










Coreopsis and Forget-me-nots in the meadow



                                                                             

This Pitcher plant is in bloom - these are remarkably interesting plants.   So far our artificial bog appears to be sucessful, it is staying moist, the plants are growing nicely, our only problem has been the persistance of the dreaded violet that came along for the ride from our supplier.

Iris virginica

We searched high and low for a place to purchase the native Blue Flag Iris ( Iris virginica).  Would you believe this one came from e-bay - listing:  "USED". 

The team of Bob and Fae Herbert.
They are documenting the collection at Sullivan Botanical Gardens. 

Sullivan Meadow and more

Blue flax (Linum perenne lewisii)

Sullivan Meadow is beginning a season long march of beautiful flowers.  If done properly, there should be a progression of bloom until late fall.  Since we have just scattered seed and hoped for the best - it is in the hands of the Lord, the Great Gardener!

Our Carolina Rose ( Rosa carolina) is in bloom as well as the Coral Honeysuckle ( Lonicera semperviens). Notice the interesting way the stem comes out of the circular leaf on the honeysuckle.

Green Garden Group Travels

April 13-15 the Green Garden Group ( 16 of us) traveled to Western North Carolina visiting the Carl Sandburg home, the Botanical Gardens at Asheville and Pearson Falls.  We overnighted at Lutheridge- just grand - and had the most wonderful time.  We saw, over 3 days, more trillium than we imagined ever existed in the world - such an amazing experience

Here we are in Carl Sandburg's Library



Pearson Falls, Saluda, NC

More!!

White Iris







White Trillium





 



Fothergilla

Blue Iris Cristata



Blue Babies !!!!

A check of the bluebird boxes at Sullivan yesterday revealed 9 eggs in 3 nests - we have a full occupancy!!

photo by Bob Herbert

We also planted Swamp Marigolds (Caltha palustris) in the bog and sunk a huge tub containing native lotus (Nelumbo lutea) in the back of the large pond.  And, as an aside - Bob Herbert went swimming, well, wading, actually. 

Tadpoles coming ( aka "Sex at Sullivan")

If you haven't been to Sullivan lately, you do need to go - the flowers are spectacular, we have given a "finished" look to the plantings around the ponds, put in another 75+ plants. And while we were busy planting and mulching - lookie here:



Tadpoles in the making
-photo by Bob Herbert



Up and blooming!!

Trout Lily ( Erythronium Pagoda)

Wild Bleeding Heart ( Dicentra eximia)



White trillium ( Trillium grandiflora)




Celandine Poppy ( Stylophorum diphyllum)

This is such an exciting time in the woods - new blooms almost daily - buds emerging, waiting for them to bloom, worring over plants that have yet to emerge.   They are like our children, we have nurtured them throught last summer's droughts and we are praying that they have survived the winter.  We joy at each discovery, we hope for the ones who have yet to leaf out.  Join the excitement, the commitment, the joy, the discovery - walk the woods regularly and observe.

92 Down, 179 To Go

Recycled pots for the new additions



Today we planted 72 marginals ( Water Iris, Blue pickerel plant, Swamp potato and Lizard's tail ) as well as 20 Spatterdock which are floating plants, similar to waterlilies.

We look forward to their emergence from the water's surface, and even more to their blooms.

These plants are placed in pots containing good ole red Carolina mud ( it is afterall what most pond sides are) and they prefer a basic soil.  We have fertilized each pot with Nutricote ( a timed release fertilizer, triggered by temperature rather than moisture like the well known Osmicote) and lime to sweeten the soil.

This was a new experience for all of us - lots of reading necessary to try to do it right.

Some of these plants have been added to the Hutchinson Court pond as part of an ongoing naturalization and mitigation of that body of water.

For the scientists the Latin follows:

 NativeWater Iris - Iris virginica

Blue pickerel - Pontaderia cordata

Swamp potato - Sagittaria latifolia

Lizard's tail- Saururus cernuus

Spatterdock - Nuphar lutea

The hand off - and into the pond it goes



Almost

Trout lilies (Erythronium pagoda) are getting ready to be the next of the ephemerals to emerge.  They are located on the right side of "Dogwood Trail" almost at the back of the woods. Look for the #11.

Fiddleheads of the Christmas fern are unfurling near the small pond.