Anybody Seen My Focus?: Spring Is In The Air: Fort Yargo State Park, Section B To The Dam, June 4th (Part 2)

Sunday, June 21, 2015

Spring Is In The Air: Fort Yargo State Park, Section B To The Dam, June 4th (Part 2)

June 4th. (Continued from…) When I visited Fort Yargo State Park in mid-February, there were few signs of Spring. The only wildflower plants that were obvious were the leaves of Cranefly Orchids (Tipularia discolor) that I found in many places.

The route… I’ve described it here, here, here, and here This walk doesn’t have the variety of wildflowers as my other walk from the Group A Shelter to the Old Fort but it does have some gems. One of the Smallflower (Asimina parviflora) had developed fruit that, unfortunately, it had lost; the Pink Lady’s Slipper (Cypripedium acaule) Orchids had bloomed, and some Green Adder’s-mouth (Malaxis unifolia) Orchids were blooming.

My previous walk on this trail had bordered on boring. The only ‘new’ wildflower was the Butterfly Milkweed (Asclepias tuberosa) that had set buds, but this walk would be very interesting.

The New Jersey Tea (Ceanothus americanus) was still blooming. The individual flowers are very delicate.

The mysterious, unidentified oak galls were drying up; there was no sign of anything breaking out of the gall.

At last… A Green Arrow Arum (Peltandra virginicus) in bloom. A dusting of pollen is visible at the base of the flower.

Just after I crossed a small bridge on the north-facing shore of the lake, I noticed a lot of white material on a rotten log. I usually think of fungal mycelium (that is all but unidentifiable without fruiting bodies) when I see this. But, with seeing the Red Raspberry slime mold earlier, I took a closer look and found that this was also a slime mold, that I was able to identify as Coral Slime (Ceratiomyxa fruticulosa). I saw this slime mold on a lot of moist, rotting wood.

One of the developing seed capsules on the Perfoliate Bellwort (Uvularia perfoliata) looked really healthy.

Then on to check on if the..

Ebony Spleenwort (Asplenium platyneuron) spore packets had released their spores. No sign that they have yet.

The Green Adder’s Mouth Orchids (Malaxis unifolia) were still blooming. It does…

look, judging by the swelling below the flower, like a couple of flowers may have been fertilized. It’ll be interesting to see if these capsules mature. The fertilized flower looks more like an adder's mouth than do the unfertilized flowers.

The Pipsissewa (Chimaphila maculata) plants just beyond the Green Adder’s-mouth Orchids were still blooming. These are such unusual flowers.

When I got back to the log with the Red Raspberry slime mold, I wanted to take another look. I worked my way further along the log and found more slime molds.

These molds had completed fruiting, and...

these, although they had some mature fruiting bodies, still had active plasmodium near them. Further along the log, I found a…

Chocolate Tube Slime (Stemonitis sp.). I had seen many photos of this slime mold but had never seen any in nature. They were only about 0.5 inches high. For me, this was an exciting find. Certainly, this will be a log to check on a regular basis when it has rained.