Summer 2025 has not been the most productive for this nature blogger. Persistent post-surgical knee pain, plus almost daily rainstorms alternating with days of stifling heat, have limited my tolerance for hours-long nature adventures on my feet. Then, just as I'm able to get in and out of my canoe, the Hudson River (my favorite paddle place) is currently lowered to allow for dam repairs, so the gorgeous wildflowers that abound on its banks will remain unseen by me. And, oh yes, my camera just died. (I'm happy to report, a replacement has just arrived.)
Lucky for me, my camera still worked on two of the nature outings I did manage to enjoy these past few weeks, both of them to open meadow-like sites where some of the season's most colorful and interesting blooms were at their best.
Late June, Mud Pond Powerline
This stretch of an open clearcut area under a powerline in Moreau Lake State Park is home to one of our most spectacular native wildflowers, the Wood Lily (Lilium philadelphicum). As soon as we stepped onto this sandy, sun-baked path, we could spot many of the vivid orange blooms standing tall amid oak and pine saplings.
It was quite a triumph to see so many healthy lilies where a few years ago they were all killed by herbicide spraying under the powerline wires. Although the lilies reappeared a year or two later, they have not yet returned to their former abundance. To preserve the lilies and other special plants that grow here, the park has agreed to manually manage the tree growth under these particular lines, freeing the power company from its responsibility for this task and sparing the plants from regular doses of poison. By now, it looks as if the park's grounds crews will have quite a bit of work removing these small trees before they overcome this meadow-like habitat. Despite the name, Wood Lilies don't grow in the rich shady woods, but prefer open sandy habitats like this one. Here's a closer view of the spectacular beauty of this native wildflower:
Another special inhabitant of this powerline is our native American Climbing Bittersweet (Celastrus scandens), a plant growing ever more rare as the invasive Asian species of bittersweet takes over its habitat. While not abundant at this site, a healthy patch of our native bittersweet continues to hold its own. The terminal clusters of small whitish blooms distinguish this species from its invasive rival, which bears its flowers in the leaf axils along the vines.
While Blunt-leaved Milkweed (Asclepias amplexicaulis) is not rated as a rare plant in New York State, it is scarce enough to make it an unusual find. It does prefer the low-nutrient dry sandy soil beneath this powerline, and we are always delighted to find it here. Its fragrance rivals that of our Common Milkweed, making it a favorite of many pollinators. Deer seem to enjoy it, too, unfortunately more for its flavor than its fragrance. We did find a few specimens this year that escaped being dinner for deer.
Of all the unusual plants that thrive along this clearcut, Green Rock Cress (Borodinia missouriensis) is the rarest, rated as a Threatened species in New York State, and as Rare to Extremely Rare in most New England states. We are lucky to have a very healthy population at Moreau Lake State Park, with patches of it growing at several locations around the park. A biennial species, its numbers vary from year to year, and we were delighted to find many plants along this powerline this summer. Its small white flowers look much the same as the flowers of many other Mustard Family plants, but very few other members of this family display the long arching siliques (seedpods) that this species does.
One of the most abundant flowering plants at this site is the yellow-flowered Canada Frostweed (Crocanthemum canadense), but we could miss finding its blooms if we arrive too late in the day. Luckily, we showed up before it dropped this day's pretty flowers. More will open tomorrow. And if we come back on one of the first sub-freezing days of late autumn, we will discover how this summer-blooming wildflower earned the name Frostweed. Its stems will split as they freeze, and out will escape curls of ice, as sheer and delicate as if they were formed of frozen mist.
This low-growing shrub abundant with tufts of tiny white flowers is called New Jersey Tea (Ceanothus americanus). Yes, you can indeed make a weak-tasting brew with its dried leaves, but its most enthusiastic sippers are the hordes of insects that visit the blooms for their nectar and to gather their pollen. If I want a bug-free photo of its blooms, I usually have to keep waving them away.
Did you know we have native dandelions? We do indeed, although they are very tiny, which is why they're called Dwarf Dandelion. Very cute, too. Their scientific name is Krigia virginica, and you will never find them on well-watered, richly fertilized suburban lawns, since dry, sandy, low-nutrient habitats like this one are where they want to live.
American Hazelnut shrubs (Corylus americana) abound under these powerlines, and in late June/early July their branches are decorated with nut clusters that look as frilly as lime-green carnations. I could see the actual nuts now forming within each cluster, and this sight gets my hopes up that I might manage to harvest a few for myself come fall. Oh yeah, dream on! I have never actually SEEN the critters that strip these shrubs bare of hazelnuts well before they are fully ripe. But somehow they just disappear before I can claim even a few. That's okay. I can buy bigger, better ones already shucked at any market. I'm delighted to know that SOMEbody harvests these.
Okay, I know very well that Rabbit's Foot Clover (Trifolium arvense) is not a rare native plant. In fact, this Eurasian import is considered invasive across much of its range in America, and unlike some other clovers, it doesn't even make good fodder. Sheep and goats can manage to eat it when hungry enough, but it can cause digestive obstruction in horses and cows. Nevertheless, I adore it. Those fluffy tufts are cute as kittens, and almost as soft as kitten fur when brushed on my chin. Luckily, it doesn't compete strongly with the native wildflowers that thrive under these powerlines, staying mostly in the weedy verges along the road.
Like other clovers, it can grow where few other wildflowers would thrive, since it can capture nitrogen from the air through a symbiotic relationship with a bacterium that lives in nodules on their roots. These bacteria convert atmospheric nitrogen into a form that the plants can use, and in return, the clover provides the bacteria with energy. This process, called nitrogen fixation, helps clover thrive and also enriches the soil with usable nitrogen when the clover decomposes. So it's not only cute, it's also pretty amazing.
Ooh, talk about CUTE! Look what we found coiled beneath a hazelnut shrub on the powerline: this wee little Hognose Snake! This species of snake can usually be found in just such sandy habitats, and this site, being close to Mud Pond, offers the Hognoses' favorite food in abundance: many toads. We have no need to fear being bit by this species of snake, since its teeth are way back in its throat, used to hold onto a toad being swallowed. It does pretend it could hurt you, though. See how this Hognose, even as a baby, has flattened its head as if to look like a rattler. Okay, little one. We'll pretend we are scared, and let you go now.
Mid July, the Scout-Camp parcel of the Wilton Wildlife Preserve and Park
Another sweltering day, among many this month. But our friends in our Thursday Naturalist group are game to go, even if our trail would take us under a hot sun across a mostly shade-free meadow. But we didn't try to walk very far. Just a few hundred yards and back again. But at what's known as the "botanizers' pace," that took us from morning to mid-day.
Ah, what a gorgeous meadow it was! The green grasses were studded with clumps of brilliant-orange blooms of Butterfly Milkweed (Asclepias tuberosa), interspersed with white-flowered Yarrow (Achillea millefolium) and other wildflowers.
Here's a closer look at the vibrant blooms of Butterfly Milkweed. As this lovely little American Copper Butterfly displays, this plant is quite appropriately named.
The fragrance wafting from hundreds of Common Milkweeds (
Asclepias syriaca) in full flower was so sweet I wanted to just stand here awhile, ignoring the sun beating down and my glasses swimming off my sweat-slick nose.
The Spotted Horsemint (Monarda punctata) was at its loveliest now, with tiers of purple-tinged bracts wreathing the stems, where red-speckled yellow flowers also clustered.
Is this gorgeous deep-pink bloom a Carolina Rose (Rosa carolina)? Wild roses never seem to check all the boxes when I try to ID them. Its solitary blooms, slender stipules, and straight slender thorns seemed to indicate so, but I am never sure. But as Juliet said of Romeo, "a rose by any other name would smell as sweet." And this one was certainly fragrant!
Where the open meadow bordered the woods, we found several shrubs of Beaked Hazelnuts (Corylus cornuta), all bearing the nuts with the long beaks that suggested this shrub's vernacular name.
We had an amazing experience while walking this meadow, being mobbed by Karner Blue Butterflies. Dozens fluttered around us, landing on hands and legs and shoes and staying put long enough that we were able to shoot clear photos. Too bad their wings snapped shut as soon as they landed, because when open, those wings are truly a heavenly blue.
The Karner Blue Butterfly is a federally endangered species, with its larvae unable to survive unless they can feed on the leaves of Sundial Lupine (Lupinus perennis), our eastern native species of lupine. We found very few Sundial Lupine plants in the meadow we walked through, but there must have been some nearby. These adult individuals mobbing us had just emerged from pupae formed by larvae that hatched from eggs laid in late May. A serious threat to this rare butterfly is the introduction to eastern North America of the western species of lupine, Lupinus polyphyllus, which Karner Blue larvae cannot feed on. Sadly, L. polyphyllus can (and will!) hybridize with L. perennis, with resultant hybrids also inedible to Karner larvae. So it's quite a thrill for us naturalists to encounter evidence like this that our Karner Blues can still find pure stands of L. perennis in local nature preserves.
Those butterflies were not the only beautiful insects we saw today. Passing a patch of Spreading Dogbane (Apocynum androsaemifolium), we were delighted to find several Dogbane Beetles (Chrysochus auratus) dining on the leaves. A native insect species, the Dogbane Beetle is among our most beautiful insects, shining with iridescent colors.
These next insects, called Knapweed Seedhead Weevils, were another interesting -- and very welcome -- find. They were busily consuming one of our most invasive non-native wildflowers, called Spotted Knapweed (Centaurea stoebe ssp. micranthos), a grassland perennial plant native to Eurasia.
Spotted knapweed is able to outcompete other plants by exuding a toxic chemical from its roots, which allows it to establish and spread quickly to colonize vast acreages. Biological control with a combination of seedhead and root weevils has been cost-effective and successful at greatly reducing infestations. We naturalists found it quite exciting to witness this control of an invasive species in action. It was great to end our walk today on such a hopeful note.
