Leaders of Today’s Ramble: Don and Linda
Authors of Today’s Report: Linda Chafin, Don Hunter
The photos that appear in this report were taken by Don Hunter unless otherwise credited. Photos may be enlarged by clicking them with a mouse or tapping on your screen. Not all of Don’s photos from today’s ramble made it into the Ramble Report, so be sure to check out his Facebook album at this link.
Nature Ramble Rainy Day Policy: We show up at 9:00 a.m., rain or shine. If it’s raining, we will meet and socialize in the conservatory (bring your own coffee); if there is a break in the rain, we’ll go outside and do a little rambling.
Today’s Emphasis: Rainy day socializing and commiserating indoors, then seeking what we found in a damp but clearing outdoors.
Announcements and other interesting things:
“Plant Resilience and Conservation for a Changing Climate” – a free, virtual symposium offered by the Botanical Society of America, November 14 and 15.
The Georgia Botanical Society’s Holiday Party, is Saturday, December 7, 2024, 10:00 am–2pm, at the Newman Wetlands Center in Clayton County. The party includes a potluck lunch, seed swap, boardwalk stroll through the wetlands, and lots of socializing. Anyone interested in carpooling from Athens, please email Linda at Lchafin@uga.edu.
Don’s Pre-Ramble Observations:
Don set out this morning to confirm his tentative ID of an aster bud on on October 24. Here are the two photos with October 24 on the left and today’s photo on the right.
With its long purple rays and white disk flowers, this is undoubtedly Georgia Aster, one of the rarest plants in Georgia. It is listed as Threatened by the State of Georgia and was a candidate for federal listing under the Endangered Species Act from 1999 until 2014. At that point, a Conservation Agreement was reached by a number of state and federal agencies, conservation groups, and private companies to protect this species throughout its range. It was then removed from the candidate list. Georgia Aster is the logo for the Bot Garden’s Mimsie Lanier Center for Native Plant Studies.
A Georgia Aster in full bloom on October 18, 2018
Don has had great luck this year finding interesting plant-insect interactions on Rattlesnake Master’s flower heads. Here a Red-shouldered Stink Bug is using its piercing-sucking mouthparts to suck sap from the plant. Alas, there were no anoles of daddy-long-legs on these flower heads this morning.
Catherine spotted this Southern Two-lined Salamander in the Children’s Garden bathroom. It seemed dead but when she held it for a while, the warmth of her hand restored it. It was released soon after the photo was taken. This species hatches from an underwater egg in late winter or spring and lives underwater in larval form in streams for 1-3 years. When the larva reaches a certain size it metamorphoses to the adult form seen here.
On our way into the Visitor Center, we stopped to admire the freshly emerged pitchers of the White-topped Pitcherplant hybrids in the Visitor Center Plaza fountain. Whitetops produce two flushes of pitcher growth per growing season, with the showiest and largest pitchers coming in the fall. All of the pitcherplants in this fountain are the result of hybridization experiments, in this case, a cross of Whitetops with Purple Pitcherplant.
Once gathered in the Conservatory in the Visitor Center, we ate lots of comfort food, commiserated, and waited for the skies to clear. Don remembered a poem by Wendell Berry that I’d read on a similar occasion in 2016 entitled “The Peace of Wild Things” [(c) 2012].
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
As Ramblers wandered outside into the woods beyond the Forest Play area, we were struck by the beauty of the brightening leaves.
Heading down the hill on the White Trail extension, ramblers spotted a stump whose cut surface was wreathed in Gilled Polypore fungi. Close-up pix below.
Due to overcrowding, there were many abnormal examples of the Gilled Polypore growing among the otherwise normal examples, appearing almost like a coral reef in a shallow sea
A normal gilled, spore-bearing surface of the Gilled Polypore. Although it is a member of an order of fungi that typically shed spores from pores on their lower surface, this species has gills from which spores emerge, similar to common mushrooms.
Turkey Tail fungi are also in the Polypore order and produce spores from pores on the lower surface. I am intensely curious about what determines the colors of the bands on Turkey Tails. If anyone can find the answer to that question, I will be grateful. Recent research has confirmed that Turkey Tails contain compounds that bolster the human immune system.
Crowded Parchment, another polypore fungi, on fallen twigs. Below, the lower side of the twig showing the spore-bearing surface of the Crowded Parchment.
Violet-toothed Polypore fungi have colored zones (left) on the upper surface similar to Turkey Tails, but the lower surface is covered with sharp folds of tissue that somewhat resemble teeth (right). In time, the lower surface turns rich shades of purple.
Can you spot the Common Garter Snake in this photo? Roger C and Jan did! Photo by Jan Coyne
After reaching the bottom of the slope, ramblers wandered through the floodplain slough and spotted a caterpillar of what is probably a Yellow-spotted Graylet Moth.
Don was checking out a cavity in a hollow standing tree in the floodplain and discovered Trembling Crust, a common, globally distributed fungus that grows on rotting wood of hardwoods and conifers. The name refers to its jelly-like texture. It is inedible.
Beech leaves with sooty mold
Photo by Linda Chafin
Turban Cup Lichen occupying a rock in Dunson Garden. Photo by Linda Chafin
Sasanqua Camellias are blooming and shedding their flowers all over the Lower Shade Garden sidewalks
And speaking of shedding…
The Ginkgos in the Children’s Garden plaza are beginning to shed their leaves – a good time to re-read Dale’s 2012 account of Ginkgo leaf fall.
“Autumn has an abundance of dreary, drizzly days when everything is drained of color and the chill penetrates to the bone. On such days it’s difficult not to be depressed and the gray sky just reinforces that absence of cheer. But fortunately there is one joy that overcast skies cannot diminish: the Ginkgo tree. As fall begins, the Ginkgo starts to absorb all the green from its fan-shaped leaves. They become yellow at their base and the border between green and yellow gradually advances to the edge of the fan, as if all the green is being inhaled into the tree itself. Then the tree seems to hold its breath, as if waiting for some sign. When that mysterious signal arrives the tree suddenly exhales and all the lemon-colored leaves cascade to the ground within a few hours. If you’re lucky enough to be standing under a Ginkgo at that very moment you can experience the joy of their soft pelting – summer sunlight and air made palpable – as in their twisting descent they brush against your head and hands, casting your shadow on the earth beneath. Their brilliant yellow defies the drab autumnal sky and, for a moment, you can imagine you see the sun reflected in the pooled leaves beneath the naked branches above.”
SUMMARY OF OBSERVED SPECIES:
Georgia Aster Symphyotrichum georgianum
Rattlesnake Master Eryngium yuccifolium
Red-shouldered Stink Bug Thyanta custator
Southern Two-lined Salamander Eurycea cirrigera
White-topped Pitcherplant hybrid Sarracenia leucophylla X Sarracenia purpurea
Gilled Polypore Trametes betulina
Turkey Tail fungus Trametes versicolor
Crowded Parchment Fungus Stereum complicatum
Violet-toothed Polypore Trichaptum biforme
Common Garter Snake Thamnophis sirtalis
Yellow-spotted Graylet moth caterpillar Hyperstrotia flaviguttata
Trembling Crust fungus Merulius tremellosus (synonym Phlebia tremellosa)
Beech Fagus grandifolia
Sooty Mold an Ascomycete fungus
Turban Cup Lichen Cladonia peziziformis
Sasanqua Camellia Camellia sasanqua
Ginkgo tree Ginkgo biloba