Spicebush buds about to burst into flower near post # 19 – our earliest blooming shrub
and these have burst – a bush with earlier timing
Lovely spring weather mixed with a sense of unease. This is a simple post, documenting just what I noticed in the forest during three days this past week. We will have no extravagant displays of wildflowers to show you, just a few little patches here and there. So I get to notice the other stuff, as it happens day by day.
Eastern Comma, Polygonia comma, reliably early because it hibernates
Bristly red canes of Wineberry, Rubus phoenicolasius. Native to Asia, it is not very invasive in our forest.
tiny pop-ups – a bedstraw and something in the parsley family. ID please?
This and the pic below are from a place the deer can’t go to. It makes a difference. This little spring fed marsh-in-recovery would be a trampled muckhole if they could walk in it. Bright green rosettes are of Great blue lobelia, Lobelia siphilitica, grown from seed.
Same marsh as above – new shoots of transplanted Allegheny monkeyflower, Mimulusringens. This plant is uncommon in our forest.
Old fox scat with some new additions in the form of shiny seeds. One appears to be germinating. This pic is a good lesson in seed dispersal.