Recently I decided to explore the woods as it was a very hot day, and I just couldn't face being in the blazing heat a second longer. What a relieve as soon as I stepped in to the woods. Our yard is surrounded on two sides by deep woods, all wetlands. Our land includes over an acre and a half of woods. I had been so busy I had not had the opportunity to browse in there for quite some time. This time I took camera in hand and was surprised by all that wanted to be photographed.
Just finding a way into the woods can be a daunting task. When Mia was younger we used to trek on in and had started to make some pathways, by clearing the lower dead branches of many of the large pine trees. The problem for me on this particular walk, was that so much undergrowth had come up, that there was no clear way in. This is pretty much what it looked like all over.
Just getting through the first steps and into the wooded area gave me immediate relief from the heat. It was delightfully comfortable in this inner sanctum. There is quite a variety of flora and fauna within the canopy created by the towering pines and maples.
You can readily see my problem in rambling through this overgrown woodland.
The lower dead branches on the pine trees constantly offer painful pokes into all areas of the body, most especially the eyes,
so much so that I have to interrupt my meandering in order to cut myself a pathway through this unspoiled private paradise.
AH!! that's much better. Now I can proceed.
I find myself encountering some wild grape growing up into the overhead.
And in my travels, I am seeking the unusual, the unknown, that ever elusive new plant, to feast my eyes upon. On this occasion, I notice the Canada Mayflower, Maianthemum canadense, which has tiny white spiked flowers in the spring, has gone to seed. You can see a few leaves here,
and in this photo the seeds are more evident. They are a whitish brown.
And this plant has red seeds in the bunch!
This is a plant needing to be identified. I'll have to mark it so that I can see the bloom next year to get specific variety.
So many leaves as so similar, that it can make it hard to get the right identification on the first try.
Even with my trusty guidebooks, I find that I am not always able to easily identify all that I am looking to. I didn't realize how many different kinds of fern I have until I started to take pictures of them.
This looks like a new little bramble that will either be blackberries or black raspberries in the near future.
Here is a very delicate moss, which is found throughout the area.
And what I have always called Princess Pine, which I use for holiday arrangements, is actually called Clubmoss.
And that is not all, there are several different varieties of Clubmoss, this one is Northern ground-cedar, Lycopodium complanatum. I also found out, in researching threatened and endangered species, that this particular Clubmoss is not on the list. I don't have a lot of it, so it won't be showing up on any plant offers, but there is enough for anyone who might have the same wetland woods that I have who might want to try a plant.
So I took Babs through the woods to show her two new plants I had just recently identified (to be in future blog), and she remarked on how there were actually two different plants in this photo.
Upon closer look I realized that there is an erect one and a sprawling one. Need to get those erect guys identified!! Need to search beyond my guidebooks for that little treasure of information! Final bit of information from this part of my jaunt. There are lots of trees down in our woods. As we have no need of firewood, and we rarely get into the woods, we just let them decompose at will, which creates a glorious basis for new life.
Here, with my finger, I prod a section of downed log, to find beautiful rich composted soil, waiting for a new tenant.
And this is the way it is every step of my journey through the woods on this hot, late summer day. This was the first leg of this trip, and as I progressed I was awestruck by plants that I was unable to identify, and which took my breath away. Watch for the continuing walk through the woods.
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