Leader
for today’s Ramble: Linda
Author
of today’s Ramble report: Linda. Comments, edits, and
suggestions for the report can be sent to Linda at Lchafin@uga.edu.
Insect
identifications: Dale Fungi identifications: Don
Link to Don’s Facebook album for this Ramble. All
the photos that appear in this report, unless otherwise credited, were taken by
Don Hunter. Photos may be enlarged by clicking them with a mouse or tapping on
your screen.
Number
of Ramblers today: 39. Three new ramblers joined us today: Donna, who has been a greeter for
the Children’s Garden; Toby and Mark, who were recommended by Richard; and,
Caroline, a UGA student. Welcome!
Today’s emphasis: Seeking
what we find in the Lower Shade Garden, the White Trail spur crossing the powerline prairie, and the first
half of the Blue Trail.
Today’s
Route: We walked through the Lower Shade Garden, then
crossed the road to reach the White Trail Spur and the prairie. We then entered the
woods, and bore left onto the Blue Trail which we followed to a point above the Mimsie Lanier Center for Native Plants. We bushwhacked a short distance to reach
the Center’s service road and from there returned to the Children’s
Garden.
Readings:
Don
read Who Has Seen the Wind? by Christina Rossetti
Who has seen the wind?
Neither I nor you:
But when the leaves hang trembling,
The wind is passing through.
Who has seen the wind?
Neither you nor I:
But when the trees bow down their heads,
The wind is passing by.
Linda
read an excerpt from Mary Oliver’s essay “Upstream”:
“I walked all one spring day, upstream,
sometimes in the midst of the ripples, sometimes along the shore. My company
were violets, Dutchman’s-breeches, spring beauties, trilliums, bloodroot…The
beech leaves were just slipping their copper coats; pale green and quivering
they arrived into the year. My heart opened, and opened again. The water pushed
against my effort, then its glassy permission to step ahead touched my
ankles…Little by little, I waded from the region of the coltsfoot to the spring
beauties. From there to the trilliums. From there to the bloodroot. Then the dark
ferns. Then the wild music of the waterthrush…I do not think that I ever, in
fact, returned home.”
OBSERVATIONS:
As ramblers gathered, Don photographed some plants in the Children’s Garden.
 |
| Purple Foxglove flower with splotchy red nectar guides
|
 |
| Wild Indigo |
 |
A bumblebee, its pollen baskets loaded with golden pollen, is visiting
an Ohio Spiderwort flower.
|
In the Shade Garden…
 |
Bishop’s Hat
or Red Barrenwort, a European member of the Barberry Family
|
Golden Spikemoss is sometimes called Peacock
Fern, but both names are misnomers: this plant is neither a moss nor a fern,
but a member of a different, ancient lineage that also reproduces by spores. It is native to western
Sub-Saharan Africa and islands off the coast of northwest Africa. Spikemosses
first appeared in the fossil record about 383 million years ago, approximately 250 million years before the arrival
of flowering and fruiting plants.
 |
Sassafras sapling in the Shade Garden
There are no mature Sassafras trees that we know of in the vicinity so this “planting” must be the result of long distance travel by birds or squirrels.
|
|
Sassafras
leaves come in three shapes: mitten (two lobes), glove (three lobes), and
unlobed. Bark from Sassafras roots has been used as a medicinal for thousands
of years. Its powdered leaves are the “filé” in filé gumbo, thickening and
flavoring that famous Cajun dish. It was also used to flavor root beer, candy,
and toothpaste. [Note: safrole, the physiologically active compound in Sassafras,
has been shown to cause cancer and liver damage in animals; in 1976, the US
Food and Drug Administration ruled that products containing safrole could not
be sold for human consumption.] Sassafras leaves are larval hosts for 38 species of butterflies and moths.
 |
Sassafras leaf shapes
Photo by Metro Parks, Butler County, Ohio
|
 |
| Tulip Tree flower with ant licking sugary nectar produced by nectar glands in the orange petal patches. Tulip Tree flowers are also visited by honey bees, native bees, and hummingbirds. |
Tulip
Tree flowers produce an amazing amount of nectar – in one study, a 20-year old
tree produced 8 pounds in a single season. In addition to ants, the flowers are
visited by a range of pollinators including honey bees, native bees, and
hummingbirds, all of which lap up the nectar. Squirrels, bears, and the occasional rambler (below) have also
been seen sipping Tulip Tree nectar and eating the flowers.
 |
Pale Yellow Trilliums are still in flower in the Shade Garden
|
 |
| Sweet Shrub, yellow-flowered cultivar ‘Athens’ |
Once on the sunnier White Trail, we began to see some cool-season grasses in flower. Cool-season grasses flower in the spring after overwintering (in Georgia) as a rosette of leaves. Unlike the large, showy warm-season grasses that flower in late summer and fall, these species typically have smaller, more delicate flowers.
 |
Yellow, twisted anthers and white, brushy stigmas of Needle
Grass flowers |
The
long bristle at the tip of the Needle Grass seed is spirally twisted; it
responds to changes in humidity by twisting and untwisting. If the seed has
fallen “nose-down,” the twisting motion of the long bristle screws the seed into the ground. Once
lodged in the soil, tiny, stiff, downward-pointing bristles at the “nose-end” anchor
the seed in the soil.
 |
| Needle Grass seed with long twisted bristle at the top and short, downward-pointing bristles at the base
|
 |
Witch Grass overwinters as leafy stems then flowers in April and May
|
 |
Witch Grass flower cluster
|
 |
Close-up of Witch Grass flowers
Don’s close-up photo of Deer Tongue’s flowers captured the brushy female stigmas and the oval, pollen-producing anther sacs, all emerging between the scale-like lemmas that enclose the
ovary. |
 |
Native Blue Grass species are small, cool-season grasses with tiny flowers. The anthers are lavender and the brush-like stigmas are transparent.
|
 |
Small’s Ragwort flower heads are beginning to open. Its leaves and stems are hairless except for patches of white fuzz at the base of each leaf. For ramblers who enjoy botanical esoterica, (and you know who you are, Avis) the white fuzz is officially known as “floccose tomentum.” Three species of Ragwort bloom in succession in different habitats at the Garden each spring: Golden Ragwort in Dunson Garden, Butterweed in the floodplain, and Small’s Ragwort in dry, sunny, upland areas.
 |
Funnel Spider webs are abundant in the powerline prairie. Dale wrote
about these spiders on 30 August 2018:
“Funnel Web spiders weave a non-sticky platform of silken threads with a short,
cylindrical tube at one edge. The tube serves as a refuge for the spider. When
a wandering insect walks across the web the spider detects the vibrations from
its footfalls and rushes out from its refuge to grab and bite its victim. The
bite injects a venom that paralyzes the insect and begins to digest its
internal organs. The spider carries it back to the refuge where it consumes it.” |
|
 |
Bottlebrush Buckeye, planted along the edge of the powerline prairie many years ago, leafs out much later than Painted
Buckeye and Red Buckeye, which typically break bud in early March. Each of these
young leaves has five drooping leaflets that will eventually spread horizontally. At the bottom of the top photo, you can
just see some strangely shaped leaf-like structures; below is a close-up. These almost-but-not-quite-leaf-like structures stumped us, so I
consulted Ron Lance, author of “Woody Plants of the Southeast: a Winter Guide,”
and an expert horticulturist and botanist. Ron says these are an “oddly reduced
first set of leaves just out of the bud [with what] look like rudimentary leaflets
borne on a winged petiole that is kind of a transition between bud scale
and petiole. I have seen similar weird half-leaf/half-bud scales on Aesculus
indica [Indian Horse-chestnut] seedlings growing back after freeze damage,
but not with a full set of five little leaflets.”
|
 |
The bark of young Black Cherry trees, branches, and twigs is marked with
horizontal lines of lenticels, patches of loose cells that permit the passage
of carbon dioxide into the tree and oxygen out of the tree. These horizontal
lines are still visible on the flaky bark of older trees. |
 |
Black Cherry leaves are pretty generic in appearance but can be
identified by the two tiny red glands at the base of the leaf blade or nearby on
the leaf stalk.
|
Most nectar-producing glands are found deep inside flowers where they
attract pollinators. When they occur outside the flower, on leaves or stems,
they are called extrafloral nectaries and usually play a role in defending the
plant from herbivores. Black Cherry extrafloral nectaries begin exuding
nectar soon after the leaves emerge from the bud. The sugary
nectar attracts ants (usually Western Thatching Ants, Formica obscuripes)
who supplement their sugar-rich diet by eating tasty Eastern Tent
Caterpillars which are just at that moment hatching from eggs laid the previous
fall. Nectar production from the leaf glands peaks during the
first three weeks after bud break, at the same time that the caterpillars are
no more than twice the size of the ants, making them just the right size for
an ant’s dinner. Eastern Tent Caterpillars are the primary defoliators of Black Cherry trees, making
ants important players in protecting the new leaves of this widespread species. Photos of Eastern Tent Caterpillar nests and ants are here.
 |
Just off the trail, we saw a young Black Cherry tree infected with Black Knot, a
fungal disease. Black Knot
infects other cherry species, both native and non-native, as well as wild plums, and
weakens and sometimes kills the trees.More
info here. |
 |
Perfoliate Bellwort with its three-sided
fruit |
 |
| Green-and-Gold |
 |
Smilax (aka Greenbrier) vines are famous
for their tough, prickly stems carried aloft on the branches of trees. Most
people aren’t aware that there are several species of herbaceous Smilax, with
soft, spineless stems and delicate, pale yellow-green flowers. This newly emerged plant
is probably Huger’s Carrion-flower, Smilax hugeri, rising from a large tuber. We’ll return in
the next few months to confirm that name as the plant puts out more leaves and reaches
full height (as much as 15 feet if it’s Huger’s). The common name refers to the
flowers which attract fly pollinators with a rotting-meat smell. |
 |
Nearby, a stout, purple-striped Smilax
stem, looking a whole lot like an asparagus spear, has recently emerged. This is one of the woody, high-climbing Smilax species. Tendrils
and young leaves are just beginning to expand at the growing tip. |
 |
Adder’s
Tongue Fern
Plant with both sterile and fertile leaves (left, Janie K. Marlow)
Fertile leaf close-up (right, Don Hunter) |
|
Looking
as un-fern-like as possible, Adder’s Tongue Fern is always a treat to see but
is easily overlooked or mistaken for a seedling of a lily or orchid. Unlike most
ferns, its small, fleshy leaves are not divided into leaflets nor do they bear
spores on their lower surfaces. An Adder’s Tongue plant bears only two leaves: a
smooth, oval, fleshy sterile leaf up to 3 inches long, and a narrow, pointed fertile
leaf with two rows of spore-producing sporangia. The fertile leaf with its
pointed tip – somebody’s idea of a snake’s tongue – arises on the stem near the base
of the sterile leaf. Each plant has up to 20 roots that spread and proliferate,
forming clonal patches. This species is fairly common in north and central
Georgia but is easy to miss; look for it in the spring when the presence of the
fertile leaf makes it somewhat more conspicuous. It likes successional woods, bottomlands,
and grassy openings at the edges of thickets.
We bushwhacked downhill from the Blue Trail to the Mimsie Lanier Center for Native Plants where we found lots of plants in flower…..
 |
Georgia
Rockcress |
 |
American
Wisteria |
 |
Gray Rosemary,
a member of the Mint Family, is native to longleaf pine sandhills and coastal
dunes in Florida and Alabama (but not Georgia). |
 |
Southern
Beardtongue, so called because of the hairy, yellow “tongue” that projects from the throat of the flower. The tongue is actually a highly modified stamen, now functioning
to brush pollen off the bodies of visiting bees. The remaining four stamens
(white stalks with purple pollen sacs at the tips) curve inside the upper surface of the flower
tube. The conspicuous purple stripes are nectar guides that guide pollinators
to the nectaries deep within the flower.
[Remember, you can tap on your screen or double-click to enlarge a photo]
|
 |
A close-up view of Southern Beard-tongue buds reveals the dense glandular
hairs that cover the flowers, leaves, and stems of this species. |
On our way back to the Visitor Center along the Mimsie
Lanier Center service road, we saw some of the species in the “second wave”
of spring wildflowers…
 |
Cut-leaf
Evening Primrose |
 |
Florida
Betony |
 |
Opposite-leaf
Dwarf-dandelion |
SUMMARY OF OBSERVED SPECIES:
Purple Foxglove Digitalis purpurea
Wild Indigo Baptisia sp.
Bishop’s Hat/Red Barrenwort Epimedium alpinum X E.
grandiflorum
Golden Spikemoss Selaginella braunii synonym Lycopodioides
braunii
Sassafras Sassafras albidum
Tulip Tree, Tulip Poplar Liriodendron tulipifera
Ohio Spiderwort Tradescantia
ohiensis
Daddy Longlegs Family Opiliones
Pale Yellow Trillium Trillium discolor
Sweet Shrub ‘Athens’ Calycanthus floridus cv. ‘Athens’
Needle Grass Piptochaetium avenaceum
Small’s Ragwort Packera anonyma
Bottlebrush Buckeye Aesculus parviflora
Large-seeded Forget-Me-Not Myosotis macrosperma
Black Cherry Prunus serotina
Funnel-web Spider Family Dipluridae
Deer Tongue Witch Grass Dichanthelium clandestinum
Perfoliate Bellwort Uvularia perfoliata
Bloodroot Sanguinaria canadensis
Chattahoochee Trillium Trillium decipiens
Poa grass Poa annua
Huger’s
Carrion-flower Smilax hugeri
Wild Onion Allium sp.
Green-and-Gold Chrysogonum virginianum
Hickory (sprouts) Carya
sp.
Christmas Fern Polystichum acrostichoides
Smilax (shoot/sprout) Smilax sp.
Black Knot fungus Apiosporina morbosa
Eastern Red Cedar Juniperus virginiana
Loblolly Pine Pinus taeda
Adder’s Tongue Fern Ophioglossum pycnostichum synonym: Ophioglossum
vulgatum var. pycnostichum
Cutleaf Evening Primrose Oenothera laciniata
Florida Betony Stachys floridana
Georgia Rockcress Arabis georgiana
American Wisteria Wisteria frutescens
Gray Rosemary Conradina
canescens
Mouse-eared/Lobed Tickseed Coreopsis auriculata
Southern Beardtongue Penstemon australis
Witch Grass Dichanthelium sp.
Opposite-leaf
Dwarf-dandelion, Weedy Dwarf Dandelion Krigia caespitosa
