Anybody Seen My Focus?: Out With The Old; In With The New (Part 1)

March 12^th. When I visited Fort Yargo State Park in mid-February, there were few signs of Spring. The only plants that were the leaves of Cranefly Orchids (Tipularia discolor) that I found in many places. I made this visit to walk the beach but, when that didn’t work out, I decided to walk the trail again to see if there were any signs of Spring.

The route…

I love this view looking northwest just after crossing the bridge from the parking lot.

Branches of pine trees had fallen after being coated with about an eighth to a quarter inch of ice a few days previously. At first I thought the park staff had been trimming trees - in some cases they had – and it took a while before I realized that most of the branches had fallen under the weight of the ice.

I found some treasures on some of the fallen branches.

This branch had some small brown jelly ears (Auricularia sp.).

Another branch was colonized by two different shield lichens. One had fruiting cups with green inner faces, and…

a second lichen whose cups had brown inner faces. Both are probably Parmotrema sp. It’s not unusual to find lichens on fallen branches; it is unusual to see fruiting bodies on lichens on these branches.

Most of the Cranefly Orchid leaves were still healthy and green. A few were showing signs of age, and some had turned purple. The leaves will die back before the orchids bloom in July.

The best find on this walk was a fallen branch – about six feet long and up to 3 inches in diameter - with five to six different lichens.