Today’s report is written by Hugh Nourse with
photographs by, as usual, Don Hunter. Don’s album is available here. This post
has just a small selection of all his photos.

Eighteen Ramblers assembled on a beautiful morning
(60 degrees) by the Arbor on the Lower Parking Lot at 8 AM. 

Route: Foot of the Dunson garden, Power line down to
river; right on White trail; turned around and returned back to parking lot.

Sue Wilde read a poem by Deborah Love that appeared
in Peter Matthiessen’s book, The Snow
Leopard. (Sue noted that Deborah Love was Matthiessen’s first wife and died
of cancer at a very young age.):

The flower fulfills its
immanence, intelligence implicit in its unfolding.

There is a
discipline.

The flower grows
without mistakes.

A man must grow himself, until he
understands the intelligence of the flower.

Hugh read an excerpt from Joan West’s blog. Many Ramblers
will remember Joan. She was a young post-doctoral student in plant genetics at
UGA who came on many of our rambles last year. Earlier this year she started
hiking the Pacific Crest Trail and was making good progress until she was sidelined
by a stress fracture. She has been off the trail for five weeks and has two
more before she can resume her adventure. She spent some of this down time at
the Coastal Redwoods in Humboldt State Park in California. Here is the link
to her blog, so you can read her words and see her pictures of the
Redwoods.

Loblolly “Nana” & Ramblers

Our route today was quickly through the
Dunson Native Flora Garden to a new planting of a dwarf loblolly pine (Pinus
taeda ‘Nana’}.  Quoting from the garden sign: “Witches’ brooms occur on many conifers and deciduous trees. Caused by a number of factors, they result in a proliferation of shoots with short internodes. Propagation of the witches’ brooms in conifers has resulted in a great many dwarf cultivars. . . .

Our dwarf loblolly came from the JC Raulston Arboretum at North Carolina State University. A grove of these pines, propagated from witches’ broomes, is planted at the Arboretum. Plants resulting from this condition rarely set seed and are usually propagated by scion material grafted to rootstocks. But these loblollies do produce seed and 20% of the progeny grown are true dwarfs.”

[Explanatory note: An internode refers to the distance between branches or leaves on a stem. The “witches’ broom” results when new leaves or branches form a shorter than normal distance away from each other.] DH

From this first stop we went out the
power line right of way to the river and walked upstream on the White Trail
along the river.  At around 9:45 we
stopped turned around and headed back the way we had come.

Walking in the power line right of way,
Hugh pointed out some white tail deer scat. 
A lot of common mullein (Verbascum
thapsus) was in bloom, as well as false dandelion or Carolina desert
chicory (Pyrrhopappus carolinianus),
daisy fleabane (Erigeron sp.), and
mountain mint
(Pycnanthemum incanum).  Morning glory vines  (Convolvulaceae) were seen.  We repeated Dale’s story from

Goldenrod bunch gall

last week about
the leaf galls on the goldenrod (Solidago sp). 
We stopped to note that box elder (Acer
negundo) is a pioneer tree in floodplains. 
There was a lot of it about 6 or so feet high.  It will probably be cut down soon to reduce
the woody plants under the power line. The shrub layer is dominated by privet,
except where it has been removed. 

River Oats

The
ground layer includes river oats (Chasmanthium
latifolium), cane (Arundinaria
gigantea), ironweed (Vernonia
gigantea), and three species of wing stem: wingstem (Verbesina alternifolia) with alternate leaves and yellow flowers,
white crown beard (Verbesina virginica)
with alternate leaves and white flowers, and yellow crown beard (Verbesina occidentalis) with opposite
leaves and yellow flowers.

We walked up a slight slope, which is a
natural levee, to the trail along the river. 
When the river floods, the movement of the water slows as it moves over
land and deposits silt immediately, and then less so over the flood plain
behind the natural levee.  Yes, it does
build up and prevent flooding at the same level in the future, but unlike manmade
levees that are designed to channel a river and keep it from flooding, the
natural levee does not build up that high. Natural levees may also erode over
time due to heavy rains.

As we turned right to go up the river,
lots of poke weed (Phytolacca americana)
was seen,

Wood Nettle

especially in the area to the right. 
In this area privet was removed several years ago. Privet (Ligustrum sinense) was still scattered
about.  In a ditch with a bridge over it
for the path Don Hunter pointed out jewelweed (Impatiens capensis) in bloom. 
Common wood sorrel  (Oxalis stricta) was abundant, but its
bloom wasn’t seen until later on our return trip. Another ground level plant
was wood nettle (Laportea canadensis)
with alternate leaves.  This stinging
nettle has downy hairs containing formic acid that causes a painful stinging
sensation if touched.  A false wood
nettle (Boehmeria cylindrica) has
opposite leaves, although some plants have alternate leaves toward the
top.  It does not have stinging
hairs.  Both plants can be found in the
floodplain.  Near the wood nettle was
common ragweed (Ambrosia artemisiifolia).

Hugh pointed out a place where a box
turtle had laid eggs right beside the trail in a rather exposed spot.

One amazing grove of box elder trees were
really limbs coming up from the trunk of an old tree which had tipped over and
was lying on the ground.

Green Ash

We noted the dominant canopy tree was
green ash (Fraxinus pennsylvanica).  At the beginning was a smaller green ash on
which we could check out the opposite compound leaves. Close to that first tree
was a sweet gum sapling (Liquidambar
styraciflua) and possibly a chinaberry tree (Melia azedarach)  Farther
down the trail ash trees were so tall that it was hard to check out the leaves
without binoculars. One such green ash had several vines growing up it:
Virginia creeper (Parthenocissus
quinquifolia), trumpet vine (Campsis

Indian Plantain

radicans), poison ivy (Toxicodendron
radicans), and muscadine (Vitis
rotundifolia) were all going up the same tree.  Nearby several plants of indian plantain (Arnoglossum atriplicifolium) were actually
blooming about as much as they ever will.

Burr Cucumber

Climbing among the grasses was a burr
cumber vine (Sicyos angulatus).  It has a distinctive five lobed leaf and long
spring-like tendrils.

On the river side of the trail a box
elder hanging over the river had poison ivy, cross vine (Bignonia capreolata), and

Resurrection Ferns need rain

desiccated resurrection fern (Polypodium polypodioides).  An interesting group of grasses were growing
in a hollow of the tree.

As we came to the sign for the earlier
(six or more years ago) privet removal area we noted how much denser the
vegetation was.  In place of privet is
box elder, the pioneer of the floodplain. 
No privet has been removed from the river side of the trail because the
managers at the Garden were worried about erosion of the banks of the river if
all that privet was removed.  The
researchers working on this second area tried to get some land owners to try
removing the privet along the river banks as part of the experiment.  No land owners have been willing to try it.

We came upon another floodplain tree, red
mulberry (Morus rubra), which is a
native tree. Can have 3 lobed or mitten shaped,
or unlobed heart shaped leaves. Next to it was a musclewood tree (Carpinus caroliniana).  A little farther on Hugh showed everyone the
white mulberry (Morus alba) which is
not a native tree.

Grape & Roundleaf Greenbrier

Then Sue noted a hickory with an
infestation of leaf galls on

Lanceleaf Greenbrier

one branch at the boundary of the privet
removal.  After this stop we saw vines of
all kinds hanging down over the trail or over other vegetation  everywhere. 
They included a number of greenbriers: roundleaf greenbrier (Smilax rotundifolia), lance leaf
greenbrier (S. smallii), cat
greenbrier (Smilax glauca) with white
undersides of leaves, and  saw greenbrier
or cat brier (S.

Anglepod flowers

bona-nox) with
thorns and leaves with ears.  Also here
was a vine we had seen previously on the Blue Trail several weeks ago, angle
pod (Gonolobus suberosus). It was
blooming with its distinctive greenish yellow petals with dark maroon
centers.  One wall of vines included
roundleaf greenbrier, muscadine, and a new vine, yellow passion flower (Passiflora lutea) with broad 3 lobed
leaves.

Along here we identified a huge Tulip
tree (Liriodendron tulipifera). We
stopped at the second bench along the river, where Carol showed everyone the
unusual group of plants growing in the hollow of a tree where a branch had come
off.  The plants included grasses and
privet.

Turning around we headed back the way we
had come.  Noted some things we had not
seen the first time.  Of special note was
a shag bark tree 20 or more yards off the trail.  Emily used her binoculars to identify the
leaves, which were compound leaves like a hickory, so we thought it was a
shagbark hickory (Carya ovata).  We also found a wild petunia (Ruellia caroliensis)
and white avens (Geum canadense) in
bloom.  On one of the indian plantain
plants Dale identified a plant hopper. Another great find was a blooming
passionflower (Passiflora incarnata)
under the power line.  We especially
noted the difference in leaf shape from the yellow passionflower.  This one has much deeper cuts for the three
lobs, like three fingers. 

It was time to return to the Arbor, and
from there to Donderos where many of us enjoyed snacks and conversation.

Hugh Nourse

SUMMARY
OF OBSERVED SPECIES:

Arnoglossum atriciplicifolium