Late Summer, Lovely Shores

How can it be that I hadn't paddled my favorite shores of the Hudson River until summer was almost over? Well, weather was a factor, with storms forecast for several days almost every week this past month.  Old age and its aches also played a role, since access to my favorite shores lay either a steep descent through the woods while carrying my canoe, or a long tiring paddle from the easier boat-launch site upstream.  But the lure of those lovely waters, where the river runs behind a large island to meander calmly among quiet coves and into a Tussock Sedge-studded marsh, won out at last. And my best paddling pals Ruth and Sue said yes to my plea for them to join me.

Best of all, we were blessed with one of the closest-to-perfect days of the summer for paddling the river. Not a breath of wind was rippling the water, and only the friendliest of fluffy clouds were floating in a blue sky. Here was the beckoning view from the Sherman Island Boat Launch Site:

And what could make me happier than to have my dear friends along?  Here's Sue, with her camera ever-ready to record the glories of a late-summer floral bonanza along the banks. (Or of any visiting insects. Sue is remarkably adept at getting great shots of bugs.)

And here's our mutual best-buddy Ruth, a passionate "bryo-phile" examining the various mosses and liverworts bedecking the riverside rocks.

I'd wager that most folks with a distant destination would set off at a faster pace than we did.  But how could we hurry past such beautiful banks as these, studded with rosy puffs of Spotted Joe Pye-weed (Eutrochium maculatum)?

Whoa! Who wouldn't tarry to take in the fabulously colorful blooms of bright-yellow Sneezeweed and flaming-red Cardinal Flower? (Helenium autumnale and Lobelia cardenalis)

The elegant pink-tinged white blossoms of White Turtlehead (Chelone glabra) also deserved a lingering look.

Granted, the small glossy flaps of this rock-bound liverwort called Streamside Stippleback (Dermatocarpon lurida) would not call to every paddler to move in close to this bouldered shore.  But we don't get to see this liverwort very often, and when it's dry it turns a nearly invisible gray-brown color against the gray-brown boulders it lives on. Lucky for us, wavelets had recently wetted it, rendering it glossy green and very visible to us.

Ah, we were close to our destination now! A rocky Potter Point projected into the river just ahead, marking where we would turn to enter my sought-after quiet backwater and coves.  But first we moseyed into this small quiet marsh, where large tufts of rosy-tipped Tussock Sedge (Carex stricta) were beautifully reflected in the shallow water.

On almost every spiky dead tree stump that poked up in this marsh, spiders had created their webs.  Even as noon approached, droplets of morning mist still clung to the webs and glittered in the sun.

Here, we have entered this quiet backwater behind a large island, where a series of rocky promontories project into water less affected by the stronger currents of the open Hudson.  I call this particular promontory "Bear's Bathtub," due to a large basin in the rock, almost always filled with enough water that a bear could immerse itself in.

As we approached Bear's Bathtub, we passed beneath steep rocky banks that held extensive carpets of mosses, some bright green and others vividly pink.

I love how this heap of bedrock is topped by masses of greenery, some herbaceous (Wild Sarsaparilla), some woody (Basswood saplings), some ferny (Rock Polypody?), and lots of mossy, including one of my favorite mosses, Common Apple Moss. 

Here's a closer view of the spherical spore capsules that suggested the "apple" name of Apple Moss (Bartramia pomiformis).  The capsules are green when young, but now as they grow ready to release their spores, they turn brown.

Here's a closer (although not perfectly focused) view of those Bartramia pomiformis spore capsules:

Growing weary of paddling by now and growing aware of the long paddle back against the river's current, I ventured into only one of the three small coves that line the shore of this backwater. That was  where this beautiful patch of Pickerelweed (Pontederia cordata) offered me a delightful reward for my efforts to reach these "favorite shores" of the Hudson River. I'm so glad I made the trip.

Fabulous Habitat Close to Home

Twice in the last 11 years, I had to abandon plans to join expert botanists in exploring fabulous botanical habitats far from home. In 2015, a smashed kneecap shattered my plans to witness wild orchid abundance on Lake Huron's Bruce Peninsula in Canada.  And two years later, wildfires closed all access to Georgia's Okefenokee Swamp two days before I was to join a paddling party of botanists there.  So yeah, I truly missed out on a couple of remarkable outings. But ample compensation sure does surround me here in Saratoga County, New York. We are blessed with a marvelous abundance of lakes, ponds, rivers, swamps, forests, fens, and even mountains, all home to a wonderful variety of native plants. And we also have what might seem unlikely habitats for fascinating (even rare) plants: the low-nutrient, sandy-soiled, sunbaked (and sometimes herbicided) lanes that lie beneath powerlines. My friends and I went to explore a favorite one in the northern part of the county this past week.  Here are photos of some of what delighted us there. (Friends Sue and Tom precede my friend Dana and me along the lane.)

Our entrance to the powerline lane was guarded by a tall thicket of American Pokeweed plants (Phytolacca americana), the reddish stems dangling long fruit clusters of green to deep-purple berries on vivid hot-pink pedicels. While home gardeners might not wish to welcome these giant native plants to their tidy home gardens, I am always impressed by their magnificence of stature and color.  And many birds do feast on the fruits, even though they are not palatable for humans.

The trailside plants grew tall and varied,  a mix of colorful native wildflowers and introduced plants that seem to have found a place among the native species without supplanting them.

Our native Common Boneset (Eupatorium perfoliatum) certainly held its place amid the crowds of purple-flowered spikes of invasive Purple Loosestrife.

Our native Slender Agalinis (Agalinis tenuifolia) was abundant all along the lane, competing with that loosestrife for being the prettiest purple flowers in bloom.

Tall plants of the appropriately named Tall Goldenrod were displaying their yellow blooms some distance back from the edge of the trail, while this Grass-leaved Goldenrod (Euthania graminifolia) was much easier to photograph, blooming right next to the trail's edge.  I could enjoy this close-up view of it without wading through hip-high grasses where ticks could be lying in wait.

Pale-leaved Sunflowers (Helianthus strumosus) carried their large yellow flowers atop purplish stems that were covered with a whitish bloom.  Their thick rough leaves help to distinguish this species from many other similar-looking native wild sunflowers.

The red-speckled yellow flowers of Spotted Horsemint (Monarda punctata) are borne between tiers of large pink bracts, which vie with the flowers for showiness. Dry sandy soil (typical beneath many Saratoga County powerlines) seems to be this native mint's favorite habitat.

This Tall Canada Lettuce (Lactuca canadensis) was already producing its fluffy seed puffs, although it was still bearing small orange florets and unopened buds. A native biennial plant in the Aster Family, Tall Canada Lettuce can grow up to 10 feet tall, although this plant was barely chest-high on me.

Ever since discovering large patches of this Short-toothed Mountain Mint (Pycnanthemum muticum) at several places along this trail, I have returned each year to check on the so-far abundant population of this rare plant, naturally occurring populations rated as Threatened species in New York State. The bracts that surround each flower cluster have a distinctive silvery appearance, and the stem leaves are broader than the leaves found on other species of mountain mint we also found along the lane. I am happy to report that P. muticum continues to thrive in abundant numbers under this powerline.

We found a few plants of a second species of mountain mint, called Virginia Mountain Mint (Pycnanthemum virginianum), also along the trail.  These flower clusters do not bear the broad silvery bracts surrounding the flower clusters that distinguish P. muticum, and its stalkless stem leaves are narrower than those of P. muticum.

We also found along this trail a THIRD species of Mountain Mint.  This one, called Narrow-leaved Mountain Mint (P. tenuifolium), is the most commonly occurring mountain mint in our state.  From the look of these very narrow leaves, I believe it is obvious how it acquired its name.

I was not surprised to find the large pale-purple flowers of Purple-stemmed Aster (Symphyotrichum puniceum) blooming now, since this native aster is probably our earliest to bloom.

I WAS surprised, though, to find New England Aster (Symphyotrichum novae-angliae) already in flower.  I associate this vivid-purple aster so closely with autumn, perhaps I was just not ready to think that summer is shortly coming to a close.

One of the reasons my friends and I love to visit this powerline is because we find there a small wetland, permanently wetted (by groundwater, I believe) to provide habitat for native plants that thrive in just these conditions.

From previous visits this time of year, we always expect to find Sphinx Ladies' Tresses (Spiranthes incurva) here in this dampish soil.  But we WERE surprised to find SO MANY this year!  There were several patches containing even more specimens than this patch does.

I am calling the Spiranthes species that grows here the S. incurva species, but that's only because an expert botanist has identified them as this in the past. Ever since the former species called Nodding Ladies' Tresses was split up into three newly named ones, I have lost all confidence in being able to ID them, no matter how carefully I study the taxonomical differences among those newly described. Here's a closer look at the flowers of those we find here on this site.  If I am mistaken about this being S. incurva, I am hoping someone will inform me.

If these wee little flowers of Dwarf St. John's Wort (Hypericum mutilum) were not so brightly colored, I would probably never notice them. But I am not surprised to find them here, since sunlit damp soil is their favorite place to grow.

That same sunlit damp soil is also exactly the habitat preferred by Alleghany Monkeyflower (Mimulus ringens), although we found only a couple blooming here this year.

The elliptical basal leaves of this next wetland plant, Northern Water Plantain (Alisma  triviale), were so shriveled as to be unrecognizable.  And the many-branching inflorescence bore seedpods instead of florets by now. But it must have been a Water Plantain, the combination of its structure and habitat being so distinctive.

And behold!  I DID find a single little three-parted white flower that certainly clinched the ID:  "Flower over 1/4" inch wide, petals much longer than the sepals,"  according to Newcomb's Wildflower Guide.

We did see a number of different colorful butterflies among the vast array of wildflowers thriving along this powerline, but none would sit still for its portrait.  I am grateful that this White-banded Crab Spider refused to budge from its perch on the floret of a Joe-Pye Weed plant.  Perhaps it was occupied with the effort of changing its vivid yellow coloration to the paler white that would help to camouflage it while it lurked to seize its insect prey.

Before we left this powerline today, we knew we would be back within a couple of weeks. To judge from the numbers of multiple-bud-bearing plants of Fringed Gentian (Gentianopsis crinita) we found, we are in for a spectacular display of this beautiful native wildflower this year.

Cliffside Garden

As the Hudson River tumbles all the way from the high peaks of the Adirondacks until it levels off to a less turbulent tidal flow from Troy to the Atlantic, various upstream communities along its course harvest the river's  energy with hydroelectric dams.  I have visited several dams from Corinth to Wilton to South Glens Falls, and it was to the Boralex Hydroelectric facility that spans Baker's Falls in the village of Hudson Falls that I came to visit this past week. Despite significant rainfall this month, little water was plunging over the natural waterfall here.  Perhaps much of the Hudson's flow was being diverted to produce electric power?

There seemed to be plenty of water flowing below Baker's Falls anyway, as the Hudson continued its journey south. With steep forested cliffs lining the river on both banks, the view from here was truly lovely on this picture-perfect summer day.

The geology of this site has been rendered quite apparent as the cliffs were cut through to create the road leading down to the Boralex facility. I have read that these cliffs are primarily constituted of dark-colored fissured rock belonging to Ordovician-Age calcareous shale.

I would love to visit this site with a geologist who could educate me further about the history of these impressive rocks.

Standing beneath these cliffs, we felt awed by their high steep walls.  My friends Tom and Dana accompanied me on this visit.

The rock walls are constantly wetted by dripping springs, delivering high-pH nutrients to the wildflowers growing on the face of the rocks and at the base of the cliffs.  We came here today especially to find the masses of Grass of Parnassus (Parnassia glauca) that abounds here in impressive numbers. And we were certainly not disappointed!

Grass of Parnassus is not a rare flower in New York State, but its need for a wet calcareous habitat make it an unusual wildflower find, if you don't know where to seek it out. I feel lucky to know of two abundant populations of Grass of Parnassus in Saratoga County, both (including this one) on spring-watered shale cliffs along the Hudson River.

Grass of Parnassus has a rather interesting flower.  In addition to the 5 brown-tipped stamens that circle the bulbous green ovary, there are 5 sterile stamens (called staminodes) that each have three prongs (giving the appearance of 15 sterile stamens). At the tip of each prong is a small, glossy-yellow spherical structure that resembles a drop of nectar. These false nectaries, along with the green veins on the petals that act as guides to insects, serve to attract pollinators to visit the flowers.

These spring-dampened cliffs are also home to several other species of native wildflowers, including an abundance of pretty purple flowers called Slender Agalinis (Agalinis tenuifolia).

The flowers of Slender Agalinis are held on long slender pedicels, a feature that distinguishes this species from the very similar-looking but much less common Small-flowered Agalinis,  the flowers of which have very short pedicels.

A third abundant wildflower on these cliffs is Kalm's Lobelia (Lobelia kalmii),  a pretty little native wildflower known to prefer damp calcareous rock.

Although I planned my visit to this site in particular to visit the above-mentioned three wildflower species, I was also delighted to find a patch of Upright Spurge (Euphorbia nutans) growing in the rubble along the road.  I believe most spurges with their weedy habit and sticky sap are among the least-appreciated wildflowers, but this species is among our native wildflowers in New York State and somewhat less common than the abundant creeping sidewalk weed called Spotted Spurge. I love its wee little flowers that are uniquely shaped.  A small cup, 1/8 inch across, holds the male and female flowers in the center. The rim of the cup has 4 white, rounded petal-like appendages, each a thickened gland at the base that is green to red. The male flower anthers are yellow and nearly indistinct. The clump of styles of the single female flower in the center sit atop a round, 3-parted ovary on a short stalk that extends out from the flower center. Both the floral cup and the developing ovary are often blushed with red. The structure of this flower is called a “cyathium” and is common to all the Euphorbias.

Thanks go to a  Minnesota Wildflowers site for that detailed description of the structure of spurge flowers.  I have long felt curious about this structure and never knew how to describe it.  Nor to know it was called a "cyathium."  I learned something new composing this blog!