Category Archives: Wanderings

Wanderings, Wildflowers

Guesses welcomed

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I’m hoping maybe Patrick or someone else may be able to help me sort this one out, found today at Webb’s Mill Bog in the Pine Barrens. I had thought it might be False Asphodel, but that’s not it.

We drove halfway to Philly almost to visit an arboretum on the grounds of a retirement community. I was mostly interested in the courtyard gardens, private patio gardens, and the wildflower meadows, but there was also a Pinetum (with native and exotic plants), a collection of rhododendrons, an experimental planting of chestnut trees, and 55 acres of natural woodlands. The wildflower meadows were a disappointment as there were no butterflies (not much was blooming), but the courtyard gardens were very pretty. Maybe when I’m old and gray I’ll find a place like that to live. My husband was ready to find a place there today after I made him traipse through the woods for a few hours. Poor guy; his knees are bad and he’s not one for walking much.

On our way back we stopped my Webb’s Mill to see what was blooming. There were lots of those white mystery flowers and the bladderworts were blooming everywhere. We had the place to ourselves; that’s a first as the last few visits to the bog have been pretty crowded. I’m not sure what else I can expect to find blooming later in the summer, but it’s always worth a visit when I’m in the area. I’m not sure how interested the DH was in the odd bog plants, but he pretended well. He’s a good sport.

Remembering, Snapshots, Wanderings

Fishing

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We drove to the water this afternoon to escape the heat; rather than going south along the ocean (where all those pesky tourists like to congregate) we went north along the bayshore and drove through what used to be mainly fishing and clamming communities. Many of the old neighborhoods have been replaced with upscale condos and in most places the commercial fishing docks have given way to recreational marinas. The bayshore’s commercial fishing industry survives in Belford however, with a fleet of some 50 boats, including 18-20 modern lobster boats, 7-8 clamming boats, and a few traditional seining boats that are part of the Belford Seafood Cooperative.

In addition to Jersey corn and Jersey tomatoes, there is also Jersey seafood! I prefer the corn and tomatoes, but the boats are pretty to look at, too. We were hoping to find a quiet creek where we could set out our crab traps, but all the places I knew from growing up in the area were either already occupied or seemingly gone. I’d guess they’re still there, but the neighborhoods have changed so much that it’s hard to get my bearings when all the familiar landmarks seem to be gone.

This area is probably the northernmost commercial fishing fleet in the state and there’s a fair amount of historical significance there, as well. Growing up, we made fun of the people who lived there and made their living on the boats. Yet it was a thriving industry and still may be. To the person speeding by on the highway on the way to the beach, one might think our only local industry now is strip malls and big-box stores.

What local industries do you recall from your childhood? Do they still exist there?

Garden, Wanderings

Puddle party

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I mentioned that I went out the other day to photograph insects at two of the local parks. It was a beautiful day to be out, but not so great for taking photos because of a constant breeze. I was hoping to find some colorful butterflies, but other than a few impossible skippers, the butterfly of the day was the cabbage white. They were everywhere, thick as thieves! The red clover and thistle seemed to be a favorite at one park, whereas the herb garden, and specifically the lavender patch, was the hot spot at the botanical park. I’d forgotten how well these butterflies like lavender since I don’t have it growing in my own garden any longer.

Anyway, while checking the pond edge for dragonflies, I came across this group of cabbage whites puddling along a damp place in the path. I’ve seen photos of swallowtails doing this – Larry has posted a few on his blog – but I’d never seen it for myself. I read tonight that it’s usually the males that do this as the minerals they collect from the soil or manure or whatever is thought to increase their breeding success.

There’s been very little butterfly activity in my own garden so far this season. The swamp milkweed is blooming and I saw my first monarch this past weekend. I’ve been checking the plants for eggs or caterpillars, but haven’t found any. There are lots of aphids and a few milkweed beetles making their living out there, though. The black swallowtail caterpillars that I posted about last week grew very fat and disappeared – I have my eyes out for a cocoon, but don’t have much hope of ever finding them.

Snapshots, Wanderings, Whatever

Clammy weather

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I’ve been saving this pic for just the right day and today’s it! This wild rhododendron of the Pine Barrens is known by a few names: Swamp Azalea, Swamp Honeysuckle, or my personal favorite: Clammy Azalea. The flowers are very fragrant and covered with tiny hairs that give it the *clammy* name. They are said to fill the gap between when Swamp Magnolia and Sweet Pepperbush bloom, filling Pine Barrens swamps with fragrance from May through September. I didn’t find Swamp Magnolia in bloom this Spring, but Sweet Pepperbush was just waking up on my last visit to the Barrens.

The weather here in NJ has been lovely so far this season; today is the first day that it’s been clammy and summerlike. How’s the weather by you? Are you looking forward to the heat and humidity?

Snapshots, Wanderings

Cross-eyed glances

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I was out with my camera today to photograph insects at two very public parks; one is popular with rollerbladers and joggers, the other popular as a site for weddings because it’s so lavishly planted with roses and other photogenic flowers. In both places I was knee-deep in the weediest patches lush with milkweed and daisies focusing my lens at bumblebees, beetles, and butterflies. I got more than a few cross-eyed glances from passerby! Birdwatching gets a person used to the odd looks from others, I think. There was a time when I was very self-conscious going out with binoculars around my neck; lately I’ve added a camera slung over my shoulder as well as the bag of extra lenses, just in case. If rollerbladers don’t feel funny with those big wheeled-boots on their feet on a ninety degree day, why should I?

This tiny butterfly, the size of a dime, is an Eastern-Tailed Blue I think, feeding on yarrow.

Snapshots, Wanderings

Guesses, anyone?

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This is another in the pea family, like yesterday’s vetch, but the only obvious similarity is in the foliage. I think the flowers are stunningly beautiful – pink and yellow – and when I first came across it I thought it must be something very exotic, but once I figured out what it was I saw it everywhere along the sandy roadsides of the Pine Barrens. The only hint I’ll give you is that the plant contains the chemical rotenone and is thought to have been used by American Indians to stun fish, among other things. I’m not exactly sure how fish are stunned using a plant, but it’s fun to imagine how that might be accomplished.

Wanderings, Whatever

Name me

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The good idea file is empty today, my camera battery needs recharging and I have all these photos of wildflowers from the Pine Barrens that I don’t feel like writing about. So instead we’ll have a little ID quiz with some hints for those of you that don’t frequent NJ’s bogs.

Many of the photos I took at Webb’s Mill Bog last week look sort of *impressionistic* like this one; I didn’t mean for it to be that way and instead think I may have had one too many cups of coffee that afternoon. I like the look anyway and I knew what these plants were so didn’t need a tack sharp photo to help with ID. You don’t really need it either, as the photo shows the relevant parts, but you do need to know that this is another carnivorous plant that grows in wet, sandy bogs.

Happy guessing!

Wanderings

Bog beauties

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Bogs are unique places; the sphagnum mats (if you’re daring and foolish) allow you the chance to walk on water, you can watch plants eat animals, and you’re offered a view into the past. Bogs that I’ve visited in upstate NY have that primeval sort of feel because they’ve remained untouched and unspoiled since the last ice age. Webb’s Mill Bog in the middle of NJ doesn’t have that same sort of effect because it’s relatively small and next to a major highway, but I’m sure there are similar bogs elsewhere in the Pine Barrens where one can witness this topsy-turvy world without the rush of cars speeding by in the distance.

At the edge of the water, on the buoyant mats of sphagnum moss, tiny orchids gently nod in the soft breath of a late spring afternoon. These wanderers from a much more lush tropical home rub shoulders with sundews and purple-veined pitcher plants, half-filled with rainwater, digesting the days’ catch. The orchids also have their tricks to lure insect pollinators; a colorful lip or beard covered with fleshy hairs that serves as a landing platform for insects. Of the pink orchids that bloom in the Barrens, the Grass Pink Orchid is the one with its beard on the uppermost petal.

I don’t imagine these plants to be rare elsewhere in the country, but for me they’re a colorful reminder of times spent in less urban wildernesses.

Wanderings, Wildflowers

Another sundew

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I know that I had promised wildflower pics, but these other Pine Barrens oddities have me enamored. I’ll save the pretty bog orchids for another day.

I shared a pic of a Thread-leaved Sundew a few weeks ago; today I have this Spatulate-leaved Sundew. Isn’t it pretty for a bug-eating plant? Please click on the pic for an enlarged view! These plants are thought to lure insect prey by their attractive red coloring and the beads of sticky liquid secreted on the leaf tips.

Small truths, Wanderings

Small wonders

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“Maybe the idea of the world as flat isn’t a tribal memory or an archetypal memory, but something far older – a fox memory, a worm memory, a moss memory.

Memory of leaping or crawling or shrugging rootlet by rootlet forward, across the flatness of everything.

To perceive of the world as round needed something else – standing up! – that hadn’t yet happened.

What a wild family! Fox and giraffe and wart hog, of course. But these also: bodies like tiny strings, bodies like blades and blossoms! Cord grass, Christmas fern, soldier moss! And here comes grasshopper, all toes and knees and eyes, over the little mountains of dust.

When I see the black cricket in the woodpile, in autumn, I don’t frighten her. And when I see the moss grazing upon the rock, I touch her tenderly,

sweet cousin.” -Mary Oliver, Winter Hours

Not a moss, but a lichen, which I learned are composed of both fungi and algae growing together in a mutually beneficial relationship. The fungi provides the structure, as well as water and minerals. The algae, because of their chlorophyll, produce the food and the whole organism is happy.

😉

These are British Soldier Lichen, so named because their red fruiting bodies reminded some botanist of the Redcoats of the Revolutionary War. I wished I’d had my hand lens along to have a better look at these – they’re so tiny!

Watching the other naturalists during our walk the other day in the pinelands made me appreciate how different we nature-enthusiasts are from ordinary people who walk through the world without really seeing much. The *plant person* along spent most of her time trying to separate the various members of the heath family by their leaves alone. Would you know a blueberry, from a huckleberry, from a dangleberry without the flowers to give a clue? Would you taste a bit of teaberry leaf to confirm your ID by the spicy wintergreen flavor? We did! We oohed and aahed over the perched barred owl, even offered scope views to passersby – all of whom refused to even stop for a look. What’s up with that?

I wonder if it doesn’t simply come down to a lack of curiosity. Maybe I think of it that way because I seem to be curious about most anything. Also, I imagine that we place a value on these things that others do not. Why is it, do you think, that some people can sense wonder and others just wonder what all the fuss is about?