The Return of the Gentians!

There's a lovely little pond up in the northwestern corner of Saratoga County that my paddling friends and I love to visit  --  especially those of us who delight in the fascinating diversity of plants that thrive on its forested banks and even out into -- and under! -- its water.  My friend Ruth Brooks (pictured below) and I returned there this past week. We were eager to see how the flora was recovering this summer from the  devastating flood that drowned most of the pondside plants three years ago, caused by extra-heavy rains and a beaver-dam-clogged culvert.

Before that 2021 flood, these shores were home to the most abundant population of Narrow-leaved Gentians (Gentiana linearis) any of us had ever experienced.  Nearly every foot of the pond's north-facing shore looked like this photo (below) I took in late summer of 2019.  (Here's a LINK to the blog I posted about such abundance that year.)

But the 2021 flooding drowned nearly all of the flowering plants that once had so beautifully adorned the pond's rocky banks.  Even many shoreline trees succumbed.  The water beneath the leaning trunks in this photo was at least four feet deep.

Although most of the deciduous trees have recovered, almost all of the shoreline conifers died, as their bare brown branches now attest. But thankfully, most of the wetland shrubs that line the shore, like Sweet Gale, Mountain Holly, and Leatherwood, do not appear to have suffered permanently, to judge from how they are still flourishing.

In 2022,  I could find hardly any evidence of the multitudinous gentians that had lined the shore, only two stems of them that a fallen tree had raised above the flood waters with its toppled root mass.  Last year, 2023,  I was encouraged to count 5 or 6 clusters of multiple plants around my circuit of the entire pond.   But THIS YEAR, Hallelujah!  At several widespread locations along the shore, we saw many clusters of multiple plants, all in beautiful, radiant bloom. It sure seems that the Narrow-leaved Gentians are making a comeback.

The flowering plants that actually grow right IN the water seemed hardly affected at all.  Populations of Arrowhead returned to their normal numbers the following summer and continue to flourish along the shore.

The Yellow Pond Lilies also took the flooding in stride. After all, water is their element.

I remember seeing the normally floating oval leaves of Watershield several feet below the water's surface during the flood, but that did not seem to have affected their numbers over time.  Nor were the slender leaves of Narrow-leaved Bur Reed adversely affected.  This species of bur reed (Sparganium angustifolium) has flaccid leaves that normally lie flat on the water.

Vast tracts of another species of bur reed fill shallow coves with their stiffly erect leaves, and these leaves offered perches for hundreds of fluttering damselflies, amorous or otherwise, their diaphanous faceted wings glittering in the light. 

Here's another look at two of the spreadwings, better displaying the blue eyes, iridescent green thorax, and white band at the end of the abdomen, features that indicate that they could be Swamp Spreadwings (Lestes vigilax), especially since shoreline vegetation is their typical habitat.

As we passed close to patches of Sweet Gale leaning over the water, I noticed that the twigs held bunches of seedpods.  I could not resist reaching out to pinch a pod or two, releasing the beautiful fragrance that would cling to my fingertips for hours.

And what did I find crawling among the Sweet Gale twigs but this absolutely gorgeous Cecropia Moth caterpillar!

Whenever I encounter wild creatures as gratuitously colorful as this,  I cannot help but believe that at the core of creation lies a force that delights in beauty. Even the adult Cecropia moth is spectacularly beautiful, and yet does not attract her mate by how she looks but by her unseen scent, detectable by her mate from over a mile away. What a gift to us!

From gorgeous creature to one that is . . .  well, maybe a little creepy. But even more, fascinating! This large gelatinous underwater mass is found in many of our freshwater rivers and ponds, but it's still a very unusual creature. Or rather, creatures. This jelly-like glob is composed of many tiny "moss animals," or bryozoa, congealed into a colony of individual filter feeders that produce this solid mass called  Pectinatella magnifica. These masses usually form around underwater tree limbs or other wooden structures. We saw many more of them today than we have ever found before at this particular pond, ranging in size from a golf ball to a big tom turkey.

And if that wasn't surprising enough, I also saw some Pectinatella magnifica formed on an underwater rock! I have seen many of these masses over the years, but never forming on any substance other than wood.  Amazing!

And here was another anomaly: a freshwater sponge (or so I believe) that looked quite different from the ropy stuff I usually encounter, which looks more like green yarn waving around underwater, instead of this tight green stuff coating a fallen limb.  Maybe it's something entirely different than a sponge? It did have the rather gritty feeling I associate with other freshwater sponges I have found in other clean ponds and lakes. Informed opinions are certainly welcome!

For sure, this pond offers much of both floral and faunal stuff to ponder.  But it's also just plumb beautiful!  And serene! How peaceful and pleasant to float slowly and quietly along beneath overhanging conifers, enjoying both the coolness of their shade and their green piney fragrance, as well as their rippling reflections in the dark still water.

And even out of cracks in the rocks, clusters of floral beauty emerge. Like this pretty clump of deep-purple Marsh Skullcap blooms.