Leaves – Tendrils

Blackberries

Wild blackberry bushes (Rubus allegheniensis) have just finished blooming up here in the mountains. The list of insects, game birds, songbirds and mammals that these bushes benefit goes on and on. Needless to say the ecological benefit of these bushes to wildlife is quite high.

Many insects benefit from the pollen and nectar available in the flowers, others eat the leaves, sip the sap, or chomp on the canes. Game birds and songbirds eat the fruit. Mammals enjoy the fruit as well as eating leaves and canes. And the bushes themselves provide sheltering protection and nesting sites for some birds.

What I’m waiting for though is my fill of the berries. They are just at the very beginning stage. Many weeks to go as they get big enough, juicy enough and with that perfect wild in the woods blackberry flavor.

Many blackberry bushes up here. No need to search. They seem to be everywhere. The bushes spread thanks to animals distributing the seeds, rhizomes spreading underground, and as the canes reach out and touch the ground they take root. If you want some growing in your yard, you’ve got to keep a close eye on them. Otherwise they’ll run rampant.

Several weeks from now there will be loads of blackberries and maybe if I’m lucky there will be pears on the pear tree too.

Yellow Trillium

Not quite native to Virginia though I’m quite pleased to have these flowers blooming in my gardens. Yellow Trillium (Trillium luteum) is native to Tennessee, North Carolina, Georgia, and Kentucky. Some speak of a lemony scent. It must be mighty subtle. I don’t detect it.

The plants emerge from underground rhizomes which will spread slowly if left undisturbed. I’m leaving them undisturbed but they really are slow to spread. But they do seem to be quite happy! The flower consists of three tall slightly twisted lemon yellow petals and three slim green sepals sitting in the middle of a circle of three leaves. That’s really 3-ness!

Flowering Dogwood

The Flowering Dogwood trees (Cornus florida) here in my neck of the woods are just beginning to open as the Eastern Redbud blooms (Cercis canadensis) are on their way into decline. That’s the pattern every year. A slight overlapping of their big show. Like homemade vanilla ice cream with home grown strawberries on top.

In case you didn’t know, what are thought of as petals on a Flowering Dogwood bloom are not petals at all, but are modified leaves called bracts. The actual flowers of the Flowering Dogwood are those tiny yellow-green things in the very center.

No matter what the parts of a Dogwood flower are called they are a shout for glee in the mountains.

As the season continues and they’re no longer paired with their buddies, the Redbuds, they are still something that makes my heart light.

Something that calls to me to bring my camera for an outing.

As the light changes, another chance for an altered glimpse of those four white bracts with their yellow-green flowers.

Flowers on trees that intrigue me. Flowers that are just an added benefit.

And here a Blue Jay, an additional added benefit.

A Cardinal? What more could I want!

And once those flowers and bracts are gone, still pure delight as the seasons roll on. Be sure to watch those leaves. I kid you not, they begin ever so slowly to turn to red in late June. Slowly slowly slowly.

Autumn offers up berries for the critters of the forest. Berries that last what seems but a brief moment.

Hints of winter as the leaves fall. But look my beloved Flowering Dogwood trees are planning ahead. Those buds. That is spring on its way.

Spring indeed is planned for. Buds in the waiting. But the trees must go through winter. More delight!

That plan for spring the trees have made? They survive. They survive through snow, ice and cold. They survive through the wondrous winter and come into spring with blooms as their buddies, the Redbuds are blooming. Like homemade vanilla ice cream with home grown strawberries on top.

Mock Strawberry

Originally from India. Mock Strawberry (Potentilla indica). It appears very much like Wild Strawberry (Fragaria virginiana).

If you’re looking for the marvelous experience of eating Wild Strawberries more than likely you will be disappointed. The Mock Strawberry has very little flavor and is quite dry. But if you’re feeling adventuresome, it is edible.

You’ll find Mock Strawberries blooming in April. I’ve just wandered looking for blooms but didn’t come up with any flowers to photograph. So, they’ll be blooming soon. Their blooms are striking yellow, while Wild Strawberry blossoms are white with yellow centers. Keep that in mind. Yellow blooms are the Mock Strawberries.

The berries themselves are a bit different. While Wild Strawberries have seeds that are set into dimple like depressions in the fruit, and moist, the Mock Strawberry seeds are set on the surface of the round fruit which is dry. Leaves? Very similar. Each of their leaves is compound, composed of three leaflets. The edges of both leaves are serrated but the tips of those serrations on the Mock Strawberry leaves are more blunt, the serrations of the Wild Strawberry are more sharp. Best of luck with your berry hunting and let me know what you find.

Wild Ginger

Along the trails here in the Blue Ridge, come April there will be green leaves peeking up through the earth.

Take your time as you hike. There’s so much out there to see. Like patches of Wild Ginger (Asarum canadense).

Each plant sends up two heart shaped leaves that split at the soil’s surface. At the axis of those leaves the plant’s single flower appears and reclines on the forest floor. You’ve got to really look for the flower to see it. It’s under the leaves.

These blooms are maroon and the aroma is more like spoiled meat than a blossom ought to be. The pollinators these flowers attract are flies that get the job done.

I’m looking forward to finding these flowers, and after their bloom, finding their seed capsules. My camera needs to capture an image of the seed capsule of a Wild Ginger.

Bloodroot

It’s hard for me to believe since I’ve still got snow on the ground, but spring is nearly here. At least meteorological spring. It arrives on March 1. The weather here is assuredly unpredictable. We’ll see what the month of March brings forth. Spring or more winter? But plants will be sprouting no matter. One of the plants I expect will greet me later in March is Bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis). A plant that’s native to eastern North America.

Take care when you’re out hiking, particularly when you aren’t on a well established trail. These little first sprouts of spring are not necessarily obvious.

Bloodroot emerges from the soil, stem carefully wrapped in a deeply veined dark purply leaf.

As the bud grows the leaf unfurls and turns to a rich green with a silvery-green ventral side. With each flower there is a single deeply lobed basal leaf. A leaf with five to seven lobes that grows to be three to five inches across.

The flower is a burst of eight to sixteen snow white petals centered with an oval yellow-green pistil which is topped by a pale yellow stigma. The pistil is surrounded by bunches of stamens with glowing yellow anthers. The blooms don’t provide any nectar but the pollen on the anthers brings bees, flies and beetles that pollinate the flowers.

And that pollination allows the seed pod to expand. Filling with seeds that have appendages called elaiosomes. Ants bring those seeds to their larvae. The larvae is fed the elaiosomes and the still intact seeds are discarded to the nest’s “trash room” which is the perfect place to start these seeds growing. This process which happens in many cases throughout the plant world is called myrmecochory. A weird/fun word which has become one of my favorites.

Jeffersonia or Twinleaf

Jeffersonia (Jeffersonia diphylla). In 1792 the botanist Benjamin Smith Barton named this plant after Thomas Jefferson. In 1807 Jefferson had Jeffersonia growing in one of the oval flower beds of Monticello. I’m proud to have something in common with my neighbor Thomas.

Within a matter of four weeks I’ll be searching for these little signs of life. Hints of spring sprouting up from the garden’s soil.

It took missing the arrival of Jeffersonia for a few springs before I etched into my memory to be on the alert. They arrive when there is still snow around. In my gardens generally mid to late March.

Jeffersonia is native to eastern North America but is listed as a threatened or endangered plant in Georgia, Iowa, New York, and New Jersey because of habitat destruction and invasive species.

The flower of Jeffersonia is atop a bare stalk. It’s composed of eight white petals which as a bud were protected by four sepals. Two of those fading sepals can be seen here drooping below the flower, a washed out pale purple with a slight hint of green.

The petals surround yellowish stamens and in the center a green ovary. Quite the fleeting bloom, the petals fall after just a couple days.

A common name for Jeffersonia, Twinleaf, comes from the shape of the leaf. Open butterfly wings. Each pair, one leaf nearly split in two.

The flowers as they decline produce a fruit. A fruit that brings a smile to my heart. Is it a fruit or actually a smiley outer space alien?

The seeds inside this capsule each have an appendage called an elaiosome which attract ants with its lipids and proteins. The ants carry the seeds to their underground nest where the elaisomes are fed to their larvae. After the feeding, the seeds are discarded in the ant’s nest to their “trash room.” The perfect place for seeds to grow. ANT FARMERS! If you would like to add a fancy word to your vocabulary, this whole process of “ant farming” is called myrmecochory.

American Beech

Hawaiian shave ice. Snow collects in the cone shapes that American Beech (Fagus grandifolia) leaves make during the winter. It reminds me of a trip long ago. A trip to Hawaii to see a total solar eclipse. A trip to be introduced to Hawaiian shave ice, which brings me back to the subject of my post.

Beech trees are obvious during the winter up here on my mountain. They are a tree that is shade tolerant and will happily grow at an unhurried pace, just waiting for surrounding trees to decline and provide that lovely spot of sunshine. Their marcescent leaves make them stand out against the many gray trunks of larger trees. If not for the drooping sepia leaves that cling until spring their smooth gray bark would blend right in.

As the tree matures that smooth gray bark doesn’t change much. Whether a young tree or an older tree, it still looks like the skin of an elephant.

The leaves of American Beech brings to mind another member of its family Fagaceae, the beloved American Chestnut tree, which has a very similar, ocean wave edge to its leaf.

Another point that you might keep in mind if you are looking for an American Beech tree, is its leaf buds which resemble thorns. Nothing to worry about though. They look like thorns but they’re friendly.

Those leaf buds will expand come spring, the leaves unfolding into emeralds to decorate the summer vista. Then in autumn they will shout with warm color, yummy splendor.

Five Inches of Snow

It snowed overnight. Wet puffy snow has covered everything. I’ve been transported into a Christmas card waiting to be signed and sent on its way.

It’s the second snow here this winter making winter seem a bit more like the way winters ought to be. The winters that I think of when I think back to Kilmer Street and that wonderful hill. A great sledding hill, and oh! those snow forts!

I’m roaming this morning. Me with my camera getting pelted with snowballs as the wet snow dropped from the trees. We stopped to get a picture of the berries of Smooth Sumac that the Northern Flicker, and Hermit Thrush love to gobble.

The snow has really accumulated on the leaves of the White Oak tree. Young White Oak trees often keep their leaves during winter. Other trees that have this same characteristic are Beech, and Hornbeam. They are said to be marcescent.

The snow has collected in the Flowering Dogwood trees as if they are stocking up on snowballs. Getting set for that big snowball battle surely soon to happen.

Camera and I follow the tracks of a wild turkey for a long way, until the tracks take a turn up and over a rock wall. We don’t feel like climbing.

*Wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo)* *track. Glove added for scale.*

The turkey’s track is about 4.5 inches long and the big critter has a stride of 2.5 feet. WOW!

The Forsythia has reached up, catching many clumps of snow. Stretching to where the sun might have been on any other morning. Stretching tall, other branches drooping. All waiting for the warmth of the sun. The warmth of early spring to be brightened by its blooms.

Perhaps those blooms will wait a little longer. I don’t think winter is close to being over. I hope not.

Common Hackberry

Tree bark offers great opportunity to identify a tree during the winter. Some more straightforward than others. One tree that through its bark is a cinch to figure out, Common Hackberry (Celtis occidentalis). Its bark makes me think of a 3D topo map with all the ridges and valleys laid out and wrapped around the trunk.

The amount of furrowing increases as the tree ages. This image above is a younger tree than in the first photo.

Another point I pick up on in identifying, no matter what the season is, is the presence of Hackberry Galls, which are very often present on the twigs or leaves. These are caused by irritation of cells due to an insect called a Psyllid feeding on the Hackberry leaves and small branches.

In early summer you will find drupes (the fruit of the Common Hackberry Tree) on the trees. As the drupes mature they will go from green to a rich coppery purple color.

One last morsel of information not related to the identification of this tree is about a butterfly. The Hackberry Emperor (Asterocampa celtis) depends on the Common Hackberry Tree as its exclusive caterpillar host plant. No Common Hackberry Trees, no Hackberry Emperors.