Shoots, Leaves, and Flowers

The trees are still bare, but that doesn’t mean there’s no greenery in the forest. The weather was finally warm and sunny again this afternoon, so I took off for a walk to see what I could find. These green shoots sprouting in the bog are the beginnings of blue flag iris (Iris versicolor):

In the slightly higher, drier habitat of the forest floor, the tiny partridgeberry plants (Mitchella repens) have been waiting all winter for the snow to melt and the sun to return:

And, on the way back from my walk, I got very excited to spot hepatica in bloom. Hepatica flowers are my favorite sign of spring.

After the long, long winter, spring is finally asserting itself. And I have a big transition of my own coming up – watch for a new post on Saturday with a major announcement.

P.S. Are you – yes, YOU – interested in writing a guest post for Rebecca in the Woods while I’m in the backcountry in a few weeks? If so, get in touch with me using the “Contact Me” link above. See the previous post for more details.

Leatherwood in Bloom

We have two shrub-sized plants here with similar names: leatherleaf and leatherwood. Leatherleaf (Chamaedaphne calyculata) is the shrub that carpets the bogs, green in summer and russet-brown in fall and winter. Leatherwood (Dirca palustris) is a plant of the forest understory, and most of the year I walk past it without even noticing it’s there, but at a certain point in spring it catches my attention.

Its leaves don’t amount to much yet, but this is leatherwood in full flower, with tiny yellow-green blossoms along each twig.

Not every flower is big or colorful – just look at the flowers of the wind-pollinated aspen in my last post for another example. There are all sorts of different strategies for plants to achieve pollination, and there are all sorts of different flowers as a result.

Aspen Caterpillars?

Last spring when I first noticed these fuzzy oblong shapes in the grass along the path, at first I mistook them for caterpillars.

Upon closer inspection, definitely not caterpillars. These are the catkins (male flowers) of aspen trees, and they are all over the place right now. Another sign of spring.

Arizona Alligator

Alligator Juniper, that is! This fantastic tree, Juniperus deppeana, is common in the woods of southeastern Arizona. Take a closer look at that fantastic bark.

Gorgeous. No other juniper species has bark like this, and I love it. Do you agree that it resembles alligator skin?

Desert Wildflowers

When I left my house on Saturday morning it was snowing, but here I am in southern Arizona for my spring break, where at this time of year the daily high temperature is around ninety and the air smells of orange blossoms. This is also the time of year when all the desert wildflowers are in bloom – click on any tile below to bring up a slideshow with captions.

The yellow in this photo is brittlebush and the red is chuparosa.

Mexican gold poppies (Eschscholzia californica)

Mexican gold poppies (Eschscholzia californica)

Buckhorn cholla cactus flower (Opuntia acanthocarpa)

Hedgehog cactus with blooming brittlebush

Hedgehog cactus flowers (Echinocereus sp.)

Hedgehog cactus flower (Echinocereus sp.)

Palo verde tree in bloom (Parkinsonia sp.)

Bee on palo verde flowers (check out the orange pollen basket on its leg)

Chuparosa (Justicia californica)

Globemallow (Sphaeralcea coccinea)

Globemallow (Sphaeralcea coccinea)

Globemallow and… I don’t know what the pink ones are, some kind of penstemon?

The Natural History of Maple Syruping

We started tapping maple trees on campus this week. I would guess that most of my readers are familiar with the general process of making maple syrup – you tap the trees to collect their sap and boil it down to get rid of the excess liquid and concentrate the sugar. The Ojibwa Indians in this area were already collecting sap to make syrup and sugar before the first European settlers arrived, and there’s even a town south of here called “Sugar Camp” because the site was known as a center of maple tapping activity. But why do we tap the trees at a specific time of year? What exactly is going on with the sap?

Hedgehog Cactus

There are many kinds of cactus around here besides the famous saguaros – prickly pears, barrel cacti, various kind of cholla. My favorite one is the hedgehog cactus (genus Echinocereus), and I couldn’t resist stopping to snap a couple photos of them while out on the Christmas Bird Count.

They don’t grow more than a foot or two tall, but something about the little round clusters of stems is really aesthetically appealing for some reason. And in the spring they’re even more gorgeous (this is a photo I took a couple years ago)…

Hooray for cacti and their big showy flowers. Just don’t ever try to pick them.

Maple Buds in Winter

I never know what will catch my eye when I head out on a walk with my camera. Today it was the cheerful red buds on the branches of this maple tree by the lake.

These are flower buds. They’ll sleep through the winter and bloom come spring.

Marcescence

Red oak in September:

Red oak in October:

Red oak today:

See all the dead leaves still clinging to its branches? This is called marcescence. A lot of oaks and beeches, especially younger ones (and especially on lower branches, as seen here), hang onto the past season’s old dead leaves throughout the winter. The dead leaves finally drop off in the spring when new ones grow in their place. No one is quite sure why some trees do this, but there are a few theories – well, a lot of theories.

• Dropping dead leaves at the beginning of spring could provide a burst of fertilizer to start off the growing season as the leaves decompose.
• Keeping the leaves in the winter could help trap more snow around the bases of the trees, giving them extra moisture when the snow melts in the spring.
• The dead leaves could even provide some protection from cold and frost for the tree’s buds or even deter browsing by herbivores.

For more information, check out this great article on marcescence by a professional forester in Vermont. Are any trees marcescing (did I just make up a word?) in your area?

Conifer Quiz

I taught my students some conifer ID last week. Can you identify all of these species?

1:
2:
3:
4:
5:

6:
7:

Answers: 1, Eastern Hemlock; 2, Tamarack (duh); 3, Northern White Cedar; 4, White Pine; 5, Balsam Fir; 6, Red Pine; 7, White Spruce (we also have Black Spruce which looks very similar but generally is only found in the bogs)