Things I’ve Seen

This post is another full of those interesting and sometimes strange things that I’ve seen in my travels through the woods.

The trails are much easier to negotiate these days. Just a short time ago there was so much snow here that snowshoes were needed.

 

I came upon some bubblegum lichen (Icmadophila ericetorum) a while ago. This lichen gets its name from the bubble gum pink fruiting bodies. They really stand out against the light blue body of the lichen-even for someone as colorblind as I am. This lichen likes dry, very acidic soil. I often find it growing near blueberry bushes.

 

The naked flower buds of hobblebush (Viburnum lantanoides) have grown large since the last time I checked on them. We should see the beautiful white blossoms within the next two weeks, I’d guess. This is one of my favorite viburnums.

 

Regular readers of this blog know that they won’t see many bird or animal pictures here, but occasionally one will pose for me like this bird did recently. I have a blurry side view that leads me to believe it is an eastern phoebe.  Usually color blindness lets birds and animals blend right into the background when I try to find them, and that’s why I don’t spend a lot of time trying to photograph them.  This day there were several of these little flycatchers darting among the cattails at a local pond, and that made them much easier to see.

 

This robin was bobbing along beside a road I was walking on. It seemed important for him to stay just slightly ahead of me, so we played the game of me trying to catch up to him for a while before he flew off.

Oriental bittersweet (Celastrus orbiculatus) tried to strangle this tree but the tree grew out over the vine and enveloped it, choking it off instead.  Oriental bittersweet was intentionally imported to help with erosion control. Almost immediately, it escaped and began trying to take over the U.S. Once established it is very hard eradicate.

 

This example of an oriental bittersweet was as big as my wrist and like an anaconda, had slowly strangled the life out of the tree it climbed on.

Jelly fungi like this amber one (Exidia recisa) seem to be much more plentiful in winter and spring rather than in summer.  Common names for this fungus include willow brain fungus and amber jelly roll. It always reminds me of canned cranberry jelly.

Yellow jelly fungi (Tremella aurantia) seem more plentiful in the warmer months. I’ve just started seeing them in the woods again after its being absent for most of the winter. Common names for the fungus in the photo include golden ear fungus. It is very similar to yellow witch’s butter (Tremella mesenterica) but has a matte finish rather than a shiny, wet looking finish. It also seems to more closely resemble a brain.

Weeks after seeing the book Photographing Patterns in Nature I’m still finding patterns everywhere. I like the chevron patterns on these small oak buds. I think these were on a black oak (Fagaceae Quercus.) I could have verified this by looking at the inner bark, which is a light orange color, but I didn’t have a knife.

 

Cinnamon ferns (Osmunda cinnamomea) have fuzzy fiddleheads. They look like they’ve been wrapped in wool but deer don’t mind-they will eat all they can find.  This fern gets its common name from its fruiting fronds that turn a cinnamon color after starting life bright green. These fiddleheads stood about 3 inches tall and are the first I’ve seen this spring.

 

I loved the figural grain patterns on this log and wished that I could take it home and make a desk or table from it.  Who wouldn’t want to be able to see such beautiful wood each day?

It isn’t often that I see sedges flowering, so I was happy to see this one. Its grass like leaves, purple bracts and relatively large male staminate flowers at the end of the stalk tell me this plant is one of the carex sedges.  Once I got home and looked at the photo I was even happier to see the shiny leaves of broom moss (Dicranium scoparium) in the background. This moss is one of the easiest to identify because of its grass green leaves. They taper from base to tip and also curve in a continuous arc. Another common name is wind swept moss because of the way that the leaves all appear to be pointing in the same general direction. It is, I think, one of the most beautiful mosses.

The forest makes your heart gentle.  You become one with it… No place for greed or anger there.  ~Pha Pachak

Thanks for coming by.

Read Full Post »