A Great Day for Flower Finds

We had a brief break in the rain this morning, a couple of hours that gave Sue and me just enough time to make the rounds of some wonderful flower sites in Warren County.  We started out in Queensbury where Sue lives,  and first thing, we pulled off the road to listen for Meadowlarks in a meadow near her home.  There, spread before our feet was a carpet of Bird's-eye Speedwell of the most marvelous blue.  I wish I could say the flowers were mirroring the blue of the sky above, but no, that sky was still low and gray and misting us with a very fine rain.  But not wet enough to stop us.

Our next destination was a roadway near Glen Lake where we count on finding a generous patch of Yellow Lady's Slippers every year about this time.  And sure enough, there they were, glowing like yellow lamps against a damp dark bank.

I already have so many photos of these beautiful orchids, why did I want to take more?  Well, I just can't help it, I can't get enough.  And today, the overcast sky provided a shadowless light that perfectly illuminated every feature of this gorgeous flower.

Next stop was the Warren County Bike Path where it runs north from Glen Lake.  Here, the path follows a sweet little babbling brook whose music perfectly complemented the sweet birdsong that surrounded us on all sides.   We heard Common Yellowthroat and Chestnut-sided Warblers and others that even Sue could not identify. (That's Interrupted Fern in the foreground, with its darker spore-bearing structures "interrupting" the leafy growth of its green fronds.)

A jungle of plant life pressed close on both sides of the bike trail, and all that lush green was made even more beautiful by its decoration of sparkling drops.  Here's Sensitive Fern.

And this is Field Horsetail.

We had come here specifically to look for Nodding Trillium, a flower that's becoming ever more scarce over its original range, but which seems to thrive in this location.  We did find a few, but it seemed there were fewer than we'd found in other years.  But it is a plant that likes to hide, and it's easy to pass them by without seeing them.  Especially that lovely flower, tucked away underneath the leaves.

You can't miss Glaucous Honeysuckle when it's in bloom, even if it is crowded around by invasive Tartarian Honeysuckle.

 The flower clusters are as brightly colorful as a handful of confetti: red buds that open into orange trumpets sprouting yellow anthers, all encased in a cup made of its terminal leaves.

On the other hand, the small greenish flowers of Mountain Maple would be very easy to miss if they weren't borne in clusters that are held straight up from their large-leaved boughs.

While peering closer at those maple flowers, I came nose to nose with this tiny spider and its delicate web.   I think it may be a Marbled Orb-weaver, and it was no more than half the size as it's pictured in my photograph.  Very cute, with its mottled abdomen and tiger-striped legs.

We sure didn't have to search to find the Early Azalea blazing away high up on a bank.  Even if we'd been blind to its vivid coloring, we could have located it by its sweet spicy scent alone, carried toward us today on the warm humid air.

Here's a closer look at those beautiful blooms.   If you click on this photo you might be able to see the glandular hairs on the flower tubes.  These hairs and the delicious fragrance they produce are keys to distinguish this native azalea from the equally beautiful, but fragrance-free, Pinxter Azalea.

We could have stayed on the bike path the rest of the morning, but Sue wanted to show me the Rose Twisted-stalk that she had found growing in Cole's Woods, in nearby Glens Falls.   Because of heavy lumbering and extensive trail-widening occurring in Cole's Woods this spring, Sue was concerned that this unusual flower might be exterminated from this location, but we were happy to find it growing abundantly and, so far, undisturbed.  It would certainly be easy to overlook this flower, since it can't be seen by looking down from above (although you can see its zig-zagging "twisted" stalk).

  Update:  I have since learned from noted botanist Ruth Schottman that the "twisted" in this flower's name refers not to the leaf stalk but rather to the flowers stalks, a feature that is obvious when observing the live plant but is difficult to see in my photo below.

But if you lift up the leaf -- or lie down on the ground to peer underneath -- then you can see the pretty little speckled pink bells that dangle down from the stalk.  So dainty!

In contrast, Clintonia, also known as Corn Lily,  holds its yellow lily-like blooms well above its glossy-green basal leaves.

Here's another flower that's easy to miss if you're not looking for it:  Indian Cucumber Root, with a little flower as green as its leaves.

The colorful parts of Indian Cucumber Root flowers are the deep-red, oddly-elongated pistils and the apricot-colored anthers protruding downward.  But you do have to peer pretty closely in order to find them.

And then there was Wild Lupine!  Here's a flower that's about as showy as a flower can be, and we found lots of it growing in an open sandy area.  This is a favorite of bees and butterflies, and Sue is trying to get a shot of one of them here.
 

Be sure to check Sue's blog Water Lily to see what beautiful photographs she produced from our wonderful day of flower hunting.  It may take a while before she posts today's photos, but she has lots of other entries to enjoy in the meantime.

Woods Walking, Bog Hopping

Saturday dawned clear and sunny, with no forecast for afternoon thunderstorms. What a treat: a whole day to spend outdoors, and with my good friend Sue, at that. Sue wanted to show me Cole's Woods in Glens Falls, a beautiful wooded area in the heart of the city, nestled between a major highway and a shopping mall that could have been a hundred miles away when we were following the shady trails along a pretty brook. During the winter, these trails are busy with whizzing cross-country skiers, but on a warm summer day, we had the whole woods to ourselves.

Multitudes of mushrooms of every shape and color were scattered across the forest floor.

These Velvet Earth Tongues, wee little things about an inch tall and black as coal, had found a home on an old rotting tree stump.

We emerged from the dark damp woods onto a high dry sandy area under the sky, where a large number of Dwarf Dandlions lifted their tiny yellow blossoms to the sun.

We'd come looking for Blunt-leaved Milkweed in that sunny area, and we did find some, mostly with flowers long spent. But we were totally surprised to find this Poke MIlkweed, still in bloom, with its distinctive molar-sized pale blossoms dangling down on drooping long stalks.

Dragonflies and damselflies were flitting everywhere, but only a couple stopped zooming long enough to get their picture taken. I believe this is a female Widow Skimmer, with the sunlight glinting off her lacy wings.

No photograph can ever do justice to the iridescent blue-green of the Ebony Jewelwing damselfly. Even when they do sit still long enough to get a good shot.

Whoa! I kept wondering what this odd-shaped insect was, as I saw it flying about here and there. Then it landed on this leaf so I could get a good gander at it. I'd seen Robber Flies before, but never one flying around with its prey tightly clutched between its legs. The fly is undoubtably sucking the juices out of that moth.

After a fun morning walking the woods, we next headed north to a bog near Lake George, eager to see if those white orchids I saw in bud last week might be blooming by now. It sure was a beautiful day to be wandering the bog, with a bright sun lighting up the reddened leaves of Highbush Blueberry bushes.

Sue was hoping to get some photos of the Calopogon orchids that were in full bloom last week.

Lucky for us, they were still blooming beautifully. Is this not one photogenic flower?

As we approached the area where I'd found the white orchids in bud last week, this spike of dazzling white announced its presence against its green background.

And there they were: sprouting up like dandelions, one of our showiest native orchids, the White Fringed Orchis, in full glorious bloom. We had to watch where we put our feet, they were so numerous.

Here's a closer look at one of those befringed florets.

Also newly in bloom was Cottongrass, and lots of it, poking fuzzy heads high above the bog mat.

With a hot sun burning our backs, we were glad to have the cold bog water oozing up around our feet, and also grateful to have whole handfuls of sweet juicy blueberries fall into our palms at a touch.

The dark red of this sphagnum moss shows off the yellow-green of a baby Tamarack beautifully.

After gazing in rapt delight at those spectacular orchids in the bog, why would I stop to pay the least attention to this ordinary old Smooth Sumac that was blooming near where we had parked our car? Well, because it was beautiful, too. That's why. And it also smelled delicious. I never realized that sumac flowers were fragrant.