On a Sunday morning in November, sipping coffee and socializing at May's Cafe in the Botanical Art Garden,
a couple of us got to thinking: "Wouldn't it be a nice day for a nature walk in Herrontown Woods?"Princeton Nature Notes
News from the preserves, parks and backyards of Princeton, NJ. The website aims to acquaint Princetonians with our shared natural heritage and the benefits of restoring native diversity and beauty to the many preserved lands in and around Princeton.
Wednesday, November 20, 2024
Still Here--A Late Fall Walk in a Desiccated Forest
Saturday, November 02, 2024
Native Fall Color and Berries in Herrontown Woods
Arrowwood Viburnum has toothed leaves (thus the latin name Viburnum dentatum) and can turn a brilliant reddish color in fall.
We're managing the corridor for an open woodland, so that enough sunlight can reach the understory to power abundant berry making by the native shrubs. The many Blackhaw Viburnums, named after their black berries ("haw" means berry, as in hawthorn), are a dramatic example.
The preserve's largest winterberry shrub--a holly called Ilex verticillata--greets you along a bend in the Voulevarde with abundant red berries this time of year.
The largest native swamp rose (Rosa palustris) in the preserve is also near the trail, its single pink flowers emanating a heavenly fragrance on hot summer days. Its rose hips are bigger than those of the nonnative multiflora rose. While the invasive multiflora rose is ubiquitous in the preserve, there are only two native swamp roses found thus far across 150 acres, mostly because the swamp rose needs more consistently wet conditions to compete. We've started planting more of them, in wet spots that get some sun, to see if we can increase their numbers over time. Again, the battle cry: "Incrementalism!"
Beyond the boardwalk, up towards Veblen House, is a good example of a rare native shrub, variously called Hearts a' Bustin' or strawberry bush. The deer love it so much that we needed to cage it until it was tall enough to escape their browsing. Located in a partial forest clearing, it receives enough sun to develop abundant berries.
In the fall, its leaves turn white. Hearts a' Bustin' is a native euonymus (Euonymus americanus), rarely seen due to deer browsing, while the nonnative euonymus, burning bush, is ubiquitous in the preserve and largely shunned by the deer. Notice a recurring story?
Up at the horserun near Veblen House, these look like shrubs or small trees, their fall color backlit by late afternoon sun. They are in fact trumpet vines growing on some sort of structure placed there decades ago.
A different angle shows the trumpet vine with the bright red of Virginia creeper in the foreground. Both are native vines that can be a little aggressive, but sufficient shade deprives them of the energy to be obnoxious, allowing us to enjoy their best traits without any need to keep them in line.
Virginia creeper has five leaflets to poison ivy's three. These leaves look like they've donated some of themselves to the insect world.
The boulders in Herrontown Woods, bedecked by mosses and lichens, are reminiscent of whales whose gray skin has collected barnacles. Sweetgum leaves are particularly creative and varied with their fall color.
Also generous with fall color is the native winged sumac, which has started to pop up in areas where we remove invasives. They seem to be part of the soil's memory of past eras when the forest was younger, before the canopy closed and shrouded the ground in deep shade.
The loss of ash trees to the emerald ash borer is a profound tragedy, but if we can take advantage of the new openings in the canopy to reawaken a diversity of native shrubs and trees, there is at least some recompense.
Wednesday, September 25, 2024
Stiltgrass Reaches Michigan
“Stiltgrass is not like other invasives we have seen in Michigan, which spread relatively slowly and can be contained. Stiltgrass travels via water and deer, as easily as water itself."
Smartweeds (Polygonum spp.), with tiny, white to pink flowers on a short spike and a tell-tale dark blotch near the center of each leaf.
Whitegrass (Leersia virginica), which is well-rooted in the soil and has longer, thinner leaves than stiltgrass, with no mid-rib stripe.
Northern shorthusk (Brachyelytrum aristosum), with fine hairs on the top, bottom and edges of its leaves and stems, and leaf veins in a pattern resembling an irregular brick wall.
Friday, September 20, 2024
Botanizing With Seek at Indiana Dunes National Park
Things were going our way as we pulled into Indiana Dunes National Park. Swinging around the south side of the Great Lake on our way to Michigan from Chicago, we decided Indiana Dunes would be a good spot to see the shoreline. The cheerful attendant at the gate offered different options for admission. One was a $20 yearlong pass to all national parks for a senior like me. Now, that's a major perk for what still seems pretty modest longevity.
A visit to the Chicago area offers a chance to see some wonderful restorations of the region's native habitats--prairies, oak savannas, wetlands, dunes--achieved over decades, in part through a consortium known as Chicago Wilderness. Bur oak savannas had disappeared altogether under a sea of nonnative buckthorn, and had to be recreated through botanical research, invasive plant removal, and the reintroduction of fire.
It was surprising to learn that the Indiana Dunes, a product of receding glaciers and fluctuating lake levels that exposed sandy beaches to the wind, is the fifth most biodiverse national park, and is called the "Birthplace of Ecology." In 1986 Professor Henry Cowles of the newly formed University of Chicago started bringing his students to the dunes to study how a plant community develops over time. The dynamic dune landscape provided a gradient of stability ideal for studying plant succession, from the raw windblown sand of the lakeshore to the complex diversity of species growing on the older, more stable dunes further inland.
Many of the dunes were mined and carted away long ago for sand. That any survive is a long story, told on wikipedia, featuring Chicago botanists and conservationists like Henry Cowles and Jens Jenson. Some credit for preservation is also due to a woman who in 1915 abandoned city life in favor of a shack on the dunes. Drawn to the spiritual power of the landscape, Alice Mabel Gray became known as "Diana of the Dunes", and advocated for their preservation. She's featured on the interpretive signage in the park."Her unusual, free-spirited lifestyle fascinated local townspeople and newspaper readers here and across the country, bringing national attention to the Indiana Dunes at a critical time of early conservation efforts."
Alice Gray's story triggers memories of Thoreau, and a character who lived on the beach in one of Steinbeck's novels--Cannery Row or Sweet Thursday. Thoreau spent two years at Walden Pond; Gray lived on the dunes for nine.
For me, it was a chance to botanize. The pleasure of learning plants--their names, their shapes--is that you'll encounter the familiar no matter where you go. If you've gained some familiarity with the plant world, you'll find a lot of New Jersey in Indiana, and vice versa.
Look! There are the three shapes a sassafras leaf can make,and the scalloped leaves of witch hazel.
There's a whole long list of invasive species that supposedly grow on the Indiana Dunes, but I didn't see any. What a great feeling to visit a habitat where native plants are thriving. The one weed I saw was the native horseweed. It can cover whole farm fields, but here one was growing all by its lonesome, as if on display, in a crack in the concrete.
A few observations collected on the SEEK app:
Common Hoptree, Ptelea trifoliata
Tall boneset, Eupatorium altissimum
Shining (winged) sumac. Rhus copallinum
Flowering spurge, Euphorbia corollata
False boneset, Brikellia eupatoriodes
Tuesday, September 10, 2024
Native Plants Prosper in a Wet Meadow at Smoyer Park
A little video tour of a wet meadow habitat in Smoyer Park, Princeton, where lots of native wildflowers were planted and early intervention has kept invasive species from taking over. Part of my work at Herrontown Woods.
The detention basin was converted in 2016 from turf to native grasses and wildflowers by Partners for Fish and Wildlife. Ongoing followup by Friends of Herrontown Woods has added additional native species and prevented invasive species like mugwort, Sericea lespedeza, crown vetch and Canada thistle from taking over. Other aggressive plants that need to be countered are giant foxtail, stiltgrass, carpgrass, nut sedge, wineberry, blackberry, and pilewort. Native species being encouraged are big bluestem, Indian grass, various sedges, rose mallow hibiscus, ironweed, blue vervain, partridge pea, black-eyed susan, late flowering thoroughwort, boneset, monkey flower, buttonbush, and some goldenrods.
Thursday, September 05, 2024
Herrontown Woods Nature Walk -- This Sunday, Sept. 8, 11-1
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I will lead a nature walk this Sunday, Sept. 8, from 11-1 at Herrontown Woods. Meet at the Botanical Art Garden (the "Barden"), next to the main parking lot, 600 Snowden Lane in Princeton.
Come early for coffee and baked treats at our monthly May's Cafe, 9-11.
Great Lobelia is one of many native wildflowers currently blooming in the forest clearing known as the Barden.Monday, September 02, 2024
Holden Arboretum Studies Resistant Beech and Ash Trees
Sticky boards are used to monitor the presence of Emerald Ash Borers at the site.