Day Two - the Ice Meadows

After collecting the rest of our group, we headed down the mountains toward The Glen to see what plants were growing out on the Ice Meadows.  Before reaching our destination, we stopped in North Creek so Libby and I could grab a bite at Cafe Sarah.  Across the street from the shop is a wonderful tiled mural that a local artist is creating with the help of passersby.  I read about this mural in Adirondack Life Magazine earlier this year and was very excited to see it in person.  It is an amazing bit of artwork and is still in progress.  I encourage anyone who is near North Creek to stop by and see it.

I had hoped to meet my friends Jackie and/or Evelyn at the Ice Meadows so our group would have the advantage of their expertise with the local flora.  Sadly, they both had previous commitments,so we had to make do with my memory.

Right out of the gate, we had bluets, which, while common for me, were new for many of the people in our group.

Wild sarsaparilla was another new plant for many - and it was in full bloom everywhere we went this week.

While I was still living here, I had assembled a large portable library of field guides that I schlepped around when going out into the field, just to be sure I had every book I needed to identify the things I encountered.  For this trip, however, I brought just one field guide, my copy of Newcomb's Wildflowers.  This, of course, was no help in identifying caterpillars!  So, I will have to ID this larva after I get back to MI and pull out my Caterpillars of the Northeast.

The woods on the way to the Ice Meadows were full of Solomon's plume.  We also saw one true Solomon's seal that was nearly in bloom.

I'm never one to turn away from a nice pile of poo - and neither are these wonderful carrion beetles!  These are American carrion beetles, Necrophila americana. I saw these many times while I used to live up here.

These are pretty substantial insects, and such a delight to find.  Not only are they large, but they are strikingly colored and serve such an important role in our ecosystem, breaking down materials that if left untouched, might result in much disease.

Blue-eyed grass is pretty common, here and in Michigan, but they are different species.  Out in MI we have stout-leaved blue-eyed grass, and here we have common blue-eyed grass.  The flowers look much the same, but the leaves, as you no doubt surmised, are different.

Also in bloom out on the Ice Meadows was common cinquefoil,

and this mystery plant.  Is it a vine, or is it herbaceous?  The stem looked rather like a pea, with curled up tendrils that seemed to be just waiting for something to cling to.

The leaves sort of suggested bindweed, but not really.

 

And the flower left me stumped.  I tried keying it out in Newcomb's without luck.  I was really wishing Jackie was with us!  The flowers remind me of carrion flower (Smilax herbacea), but it was growing out in the open.  I hoping Jackie will tune in and confirm or deny my ID. 

A couple golden alexanders were in bloom.  We have these quite plentifully in our part of MI.

One of the sedges - it's flowers look almost like little fuzzy caterpillars.  I have no sedge ID guides with me...perhaps Jackie will know this one, too.

We really had a lovely day, which showed off the river beautifully.

Violets - the sparrows of the plant world.  I think this one is lance-leaved violet.

What was really cool about this violet, however, was what I found on the back: two tiny exoskeletons.  Winter stoneflies?  These are great indicators of good water quality.

One of the most striking plants that we found, and one of my favorites, is wild columbine.  

The Ice Meadows must be a delight for geologists.  I have never been able to retain much information about geology, no matter how often I read about it and try to study it.  I love rocks, but I just cannot remember much about them.  Still, I do enjoy the formations we saw out along the river.

Large while-flowered anemone (Anemone virginiana var alba) was a new flower for all of us.

I wish I'd brought my gall book.  This puffy white gall we found on an oak branch has turned up in several other locations on this trip!  I will have to ID when I get back to MI.

On our way back through the woods to the cars, we found two flowers we'd missed on our way out:  fringed polygala,

and pink lady's slippers.

I had been hoping that some of the early (and more unusual) orchids might be in bloom out on the Ice Meadows, but if they were, we did not find them.  The group was pretty tired from their morning excursions, and the heat of the afternoon was starting to take its toll.

We got back to our motel in Tupper Lake after 7:00, and had to search down a restaurant that was still open for dinner.  After a fine Italian meal, we gathered to make our plans for Thursday and then called it a night.  Our first full day in the mountains came to a successful close.

Search for the Orchid - Part III

Okay - I'll say it right up front - we didn't find it.

"IT", of course, being the ragged fringed orchid, aka: green-fringed orchid (Habenaria lacera).

"We" were my flower friend Jackie and I. Sunday, which turned out to be a beautiful day, we met at the Ice Meadows. Jackie was pretty sure she could relocate this orchid for me, so we were on the hunt. We walked up and down, and down and up the boulders, cobbles, and massive shoulders of bedrock, but to no avail. We found lots of stuff, but not the orchid.

But, just so you all are not disappointed, I've swiped Jackie's photo of this orchid from her blog (http://www.saratogawoodswaters.blogspot.com/) and here it is:


Now, isn't that a lovely, if understated, orchid? I've heard they exist up at the Paul Smiths VIC, too, but I've never seen one.


Here are some pics of what we actually did see.

Kalm's lobelia (L. kalmii) were blooming profusely all over the rocks. Looks a lot like the Indian tobacco I found last week, although the blossom is narrower.

There were lots of little white asters blooming, and some large purple ones. According to Jackie, purple-stemmed aster (A. puniceus) is the only purple flowered aster that blooms this early, making it one of the easier asters to identify. Asters, like goldnrods, can be notoriously difficult to ID.

I had noticed these sweet little bell-like flowers all over the Ice Meadows last week when I was on my search. Did I photograph them or ID them? No, of course not - I had done what I apparently do a lot more often than I realized: I assumed (!) I knew what they were and ignored them. It turns out, it was a new flower for me: marsh or bedstraw bellflower (Campanula aparinoides).

This funny looking plant is branched bur reed (Sparganium erectum), an emergent plant of many wetland situations. One website I found states "It is easily uprooted and therefore is not found on exposed shores or by rapidly moving water." Hm...then why is it growing here on the Ice Meadows, where moving water and ice are common through the winter and spring? Maybe it's in a little secluded nook that protects it from the worst ravages of its chosen home.

I was duly impressed by this goldenrod. There it was, blooming on a very small ledge, down the side of a VERY steep rock. It was probably a good six to eight feet below me, straight down.

And just upstream was Jackie, taking photos of the river, and of me taking a photo of the goldenrod above!

Meanwhile, about a half-dozen turkey vultures were circling overhead. HM...were they waiting for one of us to take a wrong step? Or was there a meal on the other side of the water? Perhaps they were, like us, just enjoying the strong breezes that were blowing down the river.

We had over an inch of rain Friday afternoon, so there were plenty of little pocket-sized puddles filling the depressions on the rocks.

For a delightful sensory experience, one should find some mountain mint, gently crush the leaves, and give it a sniff. It is one of the BEST mint scents in the world! I first encountered mountain mints in, of all places, the Great Swamp in New Jersey. Haven't seen them since, so I was thrilled to find them here.

This is narrow-leaved mountain mint (Pycnanthemum tenuifolium), and from a distance (it is on the ground and you are standing above it), you'd never notice the purple dots that grace the petals. Jackie handed me her hand lens and there they were!

We had a number of dragonflies and damselflies flitting around us, mostly guarding the various puddles and pools. There are several red dragonflies in the world, but this one I believe is a band-winged meadowhawk (Sympetrum semicinctum). We also saw several male eastern forktails, the masculine counterparts of the orange damselfly on my previous post.

Jackie was enthralled with this "stuff" that was clinging to the rocks underwater at one of the small pools. We both had difficulty photographing it. For me it was a matter of balance - the only dry place was a very narrow strip of rock - about the size of one foot. With my macro lens, I couldn't crouch there still enough to get a clear photo, and there was no way to spread me feet apart for a more secure stance. Anyway, we suspect it's an alga of some sort - it had these wonderful yellow blobs dotting its otherwise green surface. Hopefully an aquatic plant enthusiast will help us out with ID.

Here's another grass that was in bloom. I have no idea which one it is, but I thought it was quite lovely.

This viceroy butterfly was enjoying a meal on the Joe-Pye weed. Viceroys looks a lot like monarchs, although they are smaller and have that extra black line on the hindwings.

We found lots of boneset buds, but just this one plant actually in bloom. I belive this is just regular old ordinary boneset (Eupatorium perfoliatum), although I suspect the scientific name is one of those they've changed. Again, my field guide with all the corrections is at home.

And we wrap up with this dragonfly, which I was surprised to ID as an elfin skimmer (Nannothemis bella). I thought for sure it was a white-faced meadowhawk, based on the last photo.

Have a Happy Day!

The Search for the Orchid - Part II (a & b)

Part II a - The South Side of the River

I was so determined to find the ragged fringed orchid, that when the dog and I returned from the vet's, about 3:30, I drove once more to the Ice Meadows. I figured I still had a few hours of daylight left, and the storms they were predicting didn't sound like they were going to hit our neck of the woods. I was a naturalist obsessed.

So, back I drove, this time hitting the south side of the river. I had two choices here: the poison ivy trail that led to the cobbled beach, or crossing the railroad tracks and walking where it was grassier. Based on the photos Jackie published on her blog, I headed for the railroad tracks.

The marsh St. Johnswort (Triadenum virginicum) was blooming on this side of the river (it was just tight buds on the north side). Are these stunningly beautiful or what? They kind of remind me of the wax flowers we used in floral arrangements when I worked at the florist shop in Craig, Alaska.


These delightful little yellow flowers were quite numerous right by the water's edge. At first I thought they were birdsfoot trefoil with most of the blossoms missing, but then I remembered Jackie mentioning horned bladderworts (Utricularia cornuta). This had to be them.

A closer look proved that indeed this is what they were. The bladderworts with which I am most familiar grow in the water, and they hunt wee creatures that swim in the water around them. But there are also terrestrial bladderworts, like this horned species, and they also hunt wee creatures, in this case those that are in the wet soil in which they are rooted. Both the aquatic and terrestrial bladderworts have bladders (!), which are essentially under negative pressure. When a prey item brushes against the bladder's hairlike trigger, it mechanically opens, effectively sucking in the prey and its surrounding water (or wet soil). Ah, another pretty face that hides a carnivorous nature.

I stumbled upon a patch of racemed milkworts (Polygala polygama). As I wrote before, they are soooo tiny that one really must use a tripod to get a decent photo. I didn't use mine, hence it is blurry.

Raindrops were starting to splatter the cobbles. Only a few, but the sky was darkening and I heard a distant rumble. So, I started back. As I stumbled my way across the plant-hidden cobbles, I flash of purple caught my eye. Hidden in the branches of a shrubby dogwood was this lovely purple fringed orchid (the only one I saw). Despite its robust size, this is the smaller purple fringed orchis (Habenaria pyscodes).

Just as I was leaving the shoreline, this arrowhead caught my eye. They are such simple flowers, but I think that is why I like them so. There's a lot to be said for simplicity. I didn't stick around to key it out though. Most likely it is common arrowhead, but there are three others that are possibilities. I'll have to go back and look more closely to get an ID.

But no ragged fringed orchid. I had to bite the bullet and try upstream.

Part II b - Braving the Poison Ivy

Since the downstream foray proved fruitless for my target plant, I had no other choice but to brave the poison-ivy-lined path to the river. This was the only other location with which I was familiar, although herdpaths down to the river are numerous, thanks to the river's popularity with the locals (they aren't looking for plants - they just want to swim and luxuriate at the river's edge).

The staghorn sumac was in full bloom - I love this plant. And so do the birds - it's a native shrub that is a popular, and important, food for our winged friends.

Well, I told myself, it must be a mint of some kind. I took the photos and looked it up this afternoon. Turns out this is water horehound (Lycopus americanus), which is in the mint family. Several years ago, a friend and I made some horehound coughdrops - he really wanted to make them. As I recall, they tasted awful. I'm pretty sure the horehound used in making horehound coughdrops, however, is not water horehound.

Here are the flowers up close.

Isn't this a lovely beetle? It's actually GOLD! The closest thing I could come up with in my field guide was Calligrapha mulipunctata, which is a type of leaf beetle. The head and the scale right behind it (pronotum), however, are the wrong color - the scale should be outined with yellow. I have an ID request in to BugGuide and will let you know what they determine. Update: we think it is C. philidelphica, the dogwood calligrapha beetle. C.p. feeds on silky and other dogwoods, while C.m. feeds on willows.

This was the only cardinal flower (Lobelia cardinalis) I found blooming. In a week they should be quite spectacular.

Here's another interesting river cobble. Reminds me of pimento loaf.

It may look like blue sky, but those are actually dark grey rain clouds. The thunder was rumbling, the wind whipping up, and I finally had to toss in the towel. No orchid was worth being out on the Ice Meadows if an electrical storm was going to hit.

So, by 6:00 I was heading homeward. In the end, the clouds passed over, leaving nothing but a few drops of rain (very few - you could count the individual splats on the rocks).

I've since contacted Jackie - we're going to make another foray on Sunday to see if she can find that orchid again for me. Now that's a good flower friend!