September 11th. (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 Pawpaw (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 had bloomed and two were setting seeds. For
the moment, some wildflowers we still blooming but there was a lull between
seasons. I had thought that the slime mold fruiting was done for the year, but
I was in for a surprise. There were new fungi to be found too.
In a humid area where ferns grow, a tree had died and part
of the trunk had fallen to the ground. These brackets had ‘lost’ their violet
margins had had been colonized by algae, giving them a greenish color. These are
the Violet-toothed Polypores (Trichaptum
biforme).
The caps of young Violet-toothed Polypores were beige
colored with vioet-purple margins.
The undersides of young brackets are also stated to be a
deep violet color and have irregular-shaped pores that are visible to the naked
eye. I have found that many young Violet-toothed Polypores don’t exhibit the
deep violet color. As the brackets age, the pores deteriorate into teeth-like
structures.
The mold that had grown on the fruit of the Tulip Poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera) near the top of
the hill was quite thick but still hadn’t appeared to have harmed the
developing fruit.
Just past the Tulip Poplar, only one of the plants in the
patch of Hairy Elephantsfoot (Elephantopus
tomentosus) was still blooming, but it was covered in flowers.
A little way up the hill from the Tulip Poplar, I noticed a
small cluster of yellow mushrooms that looked like chantarelles. These
mushrooms had ‘flat’ caps compared with the slightly depressed caps I was
familiar with on Cantharellus ‘cibarius’
mushrooms I had seen in a different location a couple of months earlier.
When I turned one over, I found that it lacked the ‘folds’
that are characteristic of C. ‘cibarius.’ A little bit of sleuthing – assuming that it was a Cantharellus species – suggested that it was Cantharellus lateritius, commonly known as the Smooth Chanterelle.
Again, friends on the Facebook
Mushroom Identification Forum confirmed this identification.
I walked down to the dam and then started along the ‘return’
trail.
More of the seed capsules on the Hairy Angelica (Angelica venenosa) had ripened during
the previous week.
The gall caused by the cynipid wasp, Amphibolips acuminata, had aged considerably but was still hanging on the
Southern Red Oak (Quercus falcata)
sapling.
Hairy
Small-leaved Tick-trefoil (Desmodium
ciliare) plants were blooming at several sites along this section of the
trail.
I
wanted to follow the aging of the Daedaleopsis
septrionalis brackets
that I had found on a fallen branch. This fungus is a gilled polypore that has
bifurcated gills compared with the Gilled Polypore (Lenzites betulina) that has simple gills.
The caps were wet from recent rain.
The characteristic bifurcated gills were still visible on
this bracket.
The gills on this bracket were thinning as they matured.
Once they have thinned it becomes more difficult to see the bifurcations of the
gills; the gills appear to break at the points of bifurcation and the gill
surface shows concentric ‘ridges’ that are helpful in identifying these
brackets as they age.
From here I walked on around to the trail along the ‘lake’
shore opposite the swimming beach.
(To be continued…)
Identification references:
Related posts:
- Summer On A Fort Yargo State Park Trail: Section
B To The Dam, July 29th (Part 1)
- Spring Is In The
Air: Fort Yargo State Park, Section B To The Dam, May 1st (Part 2)
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