Deep in the Ditches of North Carolina

Cleistes bifaria

Last weekend my friend Linda and I traveled to North Carolina to join the North Carolina Native Plant Society (NCNPS) on their annual Green Swamp excursion. Since this has been a very late spring and all plants are about 2-3 weeks later than usual, I had expected that we would not see some of the blooms I'd hoped for. In fact, we did not see the famous Rosebud orchid (Cleistes divaricata), but we did find some blooms of its smaller cousin Cleistes bifaria (above), an equally lovely sight.

We arrived too late on Friday evening for the roadside botanizing in the vicinity of Whiteville, NC, so on Saturday morning our guides took those of us who had missed that on to the roadside sites first. A huge storm system in the area (covering Virginia as well) had dumped over three inches of rain two days before, and as we left my house in Front Royal, the first two holes on the golf course at the entrance were under water.

As we learned, these areas of NC are usually wet anyway--we had to wade ankle-deep into a roadside ditch to reach our first site. Linda and I had brought only old shoes, so despite our best efforts to avoid sinking, there was no help for it. Once over the initial chill of the water, it was just fine. Later on in the day, in the heat of the afternoon, our soggy shoes felt even better.

Sundew (Drosera intermedia)

Our first sightings were sundews, small insectivorous plants: Drosera capillaris (very tiny), Drosera intermedia (above) and Drosera filiformis, a slightly taller variety, growing in the muck among spagnum moss. Pitcher plants (Sarracenia sp.) were plentiful, and we encountered several varieties in flower: S. rubra, S. flava, and S. minor. Our guide, David McAdoo, pointed out something fascinating--the spots along the top and back of the hooded pitchers are actually transparent "windows" that allow sunlight to reach the inner surface of the pitcher plant for photosynthesis.

Hooded pitcher plant (Sarracenia minor).

Blooms of Sarracenia minor.

Sarracenia flava.

There were Venus Flytraps here and there, the small plants were hard to see among the grasses. And other lovely spring flowers too, purple Skullcap and a very pretty orange clover-like one whose name I didn't note down, bracken and cinnamon ferns. Also Butterworts (Pinguicula), club mosses and  plants so numerous I couldn't write them all down.

Skullcap (Scutellaria intergrifolia?)

I didn't get a single photo of the lovely Lady's tresses orchid (Spiranthes praecox) in focus--there was also a flower spike very similar to Lady's tresses from a distance, white colic root (Alestris farinosa) which ironically, I did better with. One has to look closely-- in Spiranthes as its name implies, the tiny orchid flowers grow in a spiral form around the scape. 

Colic root (Aletris farinosa)

Rose Pogonia (Pogonia ophioglossoides)

Rose Pogonia orchid grew at this site in small clumps along the ditch. After about an hour and a half here, it was time to drive on to our second stop, the Billboards--a grassy elevation sandwiched between four billboards. Heading south on 130, there were so many other billboards it would have been hard to figure out which four were the right ones, if we hadn't been caravaning.

The Billboards.

Sarracenia rubra.

Venus flytrap (Dionaea muscipula)

Sarracenia purpurea.

Here were more pitcher plants in profusion, S. rubra, S. purpurea, and S. flava, Venus Flytraps (Dionaea muscipula) in bud and flower, Sweet Bay and Maleberry (Lyonia), which looks very like a blueberry. Farther down, finally, were a few of the orchids I'd come so far to see: Cleistes bifaria and one specimen of Calopogon pallidus (the pale Grass Pink). It was hard to photograph the flowers blowing in the breeze, but I managed to get a couple of decent shots.

Calopogon pallidus

Side view of Calopogon

From my orchid studies I've learned that most orchids are resupinate, which means the flowers are rotated on their stems to be updside down, so the lip (labellum) is at the bottom of the flower. This arrangement provides a landing pad for the pollinating insect. Calopogon orchids are the exception, as you can see from the photo, the labellum is positioned above the petals and sepals. Instead, the hairs on the labellum function as a lure for the insect, and when a bee tries to lands on them, its weight causes the hinged labellum to swing down and position the bee onto the column for pollination.

We left the Billboards around noon and headed south to Shallotte for a bathroom break at the local Popeyes. We ate our box lunches in the parking lot. After lunch it was finally time to visit the Green Swamp. The Green Swamp is actually not a swamp so much as a long-leaf pine savannah or "pocosin," the native American name for these local wetlands. They have acidic, peaty, poorly-drained soils that are oligotrophic, meaning nutrient-deficient, which is probably why so many of the plants found in this environment are carnivorous. The Green Swamp is noted for its amazing diversity of plants, over 50 different species have been counted in about a one square meter plot. We entered an area known as the Big Island Savannah by crossing another deep watery ditch.

Entering the Green Swamp

Our first sighting was a narrow-leaf Milkweed (Asclepsias longifolia), and more pitcher plants of S. flava and S. purpurea.

Narrow leaf Milkweed (Asclepsias longifolia)

After a while we drove on to another part of the Green Swamp where the scent of Swamp Azaleas (Rhododendrum viscosum) pervaded the air--thickets carpeted the shady parts of the savannah, and swallowtail butterflies flitted about. We came across one rather beat-up Grass Pink orchid (Calopogon barbatus?) but my single shot was not in focus .I hoped we'd come across a couple more specimens but that was the only one I saw.

Swamp Azalea (Rhododendrum viscosum)

After we left the Green Swamp we drove on to another site at Boiling Spring Lakes, where the most incredible display of Rose Pogonias I've ever seen stretched for what seemed like a mile along a ditch. According to our accompanying botanists, the Pogonia spreads by underground rhizomes, and here it had obviously enjoyed many years (hundreds?) of uninterrupted growth to cover such an expanse.

Rose Pogonias near Boiling Springs Lakes.

Rose Pogonias grow among Spagnum moss and ferns

Rose Pogonia (Pogonia ophioglossiodes)

By this time the second battery for my camera was running low, and I was trying to conserve power, so I limited the number of my shots--with an extra battery I could have gone on to take hundreds of photos here.

Our last site of the day was yet another roadside ditch where the Venus flytraps seemed to be unusually red in color--perhaps the lack or addition of a particular nutrient? There were several more Cleistes bifaria orchids in bloom here, but at this point, my camera battery finally gave out.  After covering so much ground in one day we were tired, so it was time to head back to Whiteville to clean up and rest before dinner at the Forestry Museum and the native plant auction.

Venus Flytrap (Dionaea muscipula)

Blooms of Venus Flytrap

North Carolina has the most fascinating roadside ditches I've ever seen! Next time I'm here, I'll bring pair of oystering boots or Wellingtons. Sunday morning at Lake Waccamaw will have to be a separate posting, as this is already way too long.

For more photos see my Flicker album here.

Trillium Trail 2014

VNPS members on the Trillium Trail

On the last Sunday in April I hiked the Trillium Trail at Thompson Wildlife Management Area (Thompson WMA) with the Piedmont Chapter of the Virginia Native Plant Society (VPNS). Spring is so late this year that the thousands of trilliums (Trillium grandiflora) this area is famous for were barely out of the ground; only a few blossoms here and there and a few patches in the sunnier part of the lower portion of the hill were visible. At this higher elevation the tree leaves had not begun to unfurl yet, and it was much chillier at the top of the ridge than in the valley below.

Our hike leader Sally said that at one time it was thought that the trillium flowers started out as pure white and turned pink with age, but this is actually not so. Seeing is believing, and here was the proof--many of the just-emerging blossoms were a soft pink in bud and recently-opened blossom. I've heard theories that the trilliums in this huge stand are the result of many years of natural hybridization of several species such as T. grandiflora with T. erectum, but botanically, the pink variety is classified as T. grandiflora forma roseum and wavy edges on the flower are one characteristic of this variant.

Pink Trillium bud (Trillium grandiflora forma roseum)

We took the side trail leading to the Appalachian Trail (AT) with Sally pointing out many interesting plants, some of which I was familiar with, and others unknown to me, including a native mustard that is the host plant for the West Virginia White butterfly (Pieris virginiensis). I didn't know that this native butterfly has been steadily declining since the 1990's, and one reason is that the butterfly seems to get confused and lays its eggs on that invasive plague, garlic mustard, instead of its host plant. The caterpillars cannot survive on garlic mustard, and when the butterfly does not reproduce, the population in those areas can be wiped out.

A lady who befriended me on the previous hike, Mary Keith, told me that the Piedmont Chapter  maintains the Trillium Trail to try to keep the garlic mustard under control, and sure enough, as we walked she and several other ladies pulled up any traces of the noxious invader we came across and bagged them to dispose of them later. Evidently garlic mustard is so programmed for survival that even after being pulled up, any flowers on the stems can set seed and spread, so the plants can't be left lying around on the ground.

Turning left onto the AT we encountered many early spring ephemerals blooming along trail: bloodroot, wild ginger, blue and smooth yellow violets, and Canada mayflower.

Bloodroot flower (Sanguinaria canadensis)

Wild ginger flower (Asarum canadense)

Canada mayflower (Maianthemum canadense)

Blue and Smooth Yellow Violets.

I looked for the Showy orchid, hoping to catch a glimpse of some and eventually I spotted one nice clump emerging by the side of the trail. The fleshy leaves formed a curious vase-like cup with the tiny flower spike bud barely visible inside.

Showy orchid (Galearis spectabilis) emerging from forest floor

Further down the hill we encountered a seep, full of skunk cabbage and other interesting plants, among them the false hellebore I had seen last year at Big Meadows on Skyline Drive, and another type of saxifrage with toothed leaf margins.

False Hellebore (Veratrum viride)

 At the junction of the AT with the fire road we turned left to go up the hill. Many huge trees had come down during the harsh winter, the dead trunks and branches strewn all over the ground, cut only to allow passage on the fire road. The lumber on the ground obscured most of the areas where I'd seen Yellow Lady Slipper orchids in years past, but I found a few orchid plants emerging from the leaf litter. At this stage, the plant would have been difficult to identify if I hadn't known the location

Yellow Lady Slipper orchid emerging from the forest floor.

As we were approaching the end of our circular hike, near the parking area, a patch lovely of trout lilies greeted us by way of bidding our group good-bye. These plants had quite a few leaves, more than the usual two per blooming plant.

Calme's Neck

The Shenandoah River at Calme's Neck

A few Saturdays past I joined the Virginia Native Plant Society's Piedmont Chapter on a walk at Calme's Neck. This site is registered by VNPS as a unique area full of native plants, some quite unusual, and is on private land. One of the VNPS members who lives in this development hosted the group.

After driving up and around some steep curves on a gravel road for several miles, I arrived a little later than the announced 10 AM meting time. Our hike leader, Gary Fleming, a gentleman who has been mapping the flora of Virginia for the past 30 years for the Digital Atlas of the Virginia Flora, was about to conclude his introductory talk. There is probably not a corner of the state that he has not covered at some time or another. There were about 25-30 of us in the group--some of the VNPS chapter members have been visiting this particular site for the past 21 years.

Gary Fleming with VNPS hikers

We started our hike near the top of a hill and walked towards some rocky high bluffs overlooking the Shenandoah river. The just-budding trees were bare enough to allow spectacular views of the farms on the other bank and the distant mountains on the other side of the valley.

The rock ledges sheltered a variety of mosses, early Saxifrage (Saxifraga virginiensis), and ferns, among them walking fern, which I've only seen once before in Maryland.

Flower Buds of Early Saxifrage

Rock ledge with mosses, walking fern (on upper left ledge) and saxifrage

Rare rose moss (Rhodobryum rosea)

Beyond the bluffs, the hill sloped down and the trail parallelled the river. Virginia Bluebells grew thickly along this floodplain, but with spring so late, their flower buds were still pink and rolled up tight. There were also both Dutchman's Breeches and Squirrel Corn plants here and there, and one of the ladies on the hike (they were all so knowledgeable!) explained the differences between these two very similar plants: the "breeches" of the Squirrel Corn are much tighter, resembling the Bleeding Heart, the leaves are bluer, and true to their name, the Squirrel Corn has a small underground tuber that resembles a grain of corn (we didn't dig one up to verify this).

Dutchman's Breeches (Dicentra cucullaria)

Squirrel Corn (Dicentra eximia)

After a while the floodplain narrowed out and we turned inland to walk up a very steep hill that was covered with spring flowers. Twin leaf, a low-growing plant with star-shaped white flowers that I had never noticed before, grew all over the slope. There were also trout lilies, but only one of these in bloom. The more knowledgeable members of the group explained that trout lilies must develop two leaves before they will bloom, and the individual plants found in these woods don't do this very often, although in other regions they do bloom profusely.

Twin Leaf (Jeffersonia diphylla)

At one point on the slope I found something among the carpet of leaves that I though might be a dead bird, but upon closer examination it turned out to be a huge owl pellet, with tiny bones imbedded. It was relatively fresh, indicating a large own had been here recently--a barn owl, or something more picturesque?

Owl pellet

Back at the top of the hill, I eventually saw our parked cars through the tree trunks, so we had hiked around in a big circle. I was among the laggards at the rear, and most of the other folks had already driven down the gravel road to have our brown-bag lunches by the river. Our picnic site was a lovely grassy spot  by the banks of the Shenandoah where the residents of this private enclave had placed a picnic table. It was nice opportunity to get to meet the other members, and quite by coincidence, one of the young ladies in the day's hike turned out to be someone I had been corresponding via Email at the botanist's office in Shenandoah National Park.

Cormorants perch on trees along the Shenandoah River

Our hostess, Blanca, had been born in Argentina, and naturally, we spoke a bit in Spanish.  As we ate our lunch, we were amused by a group of cormorants flying around on the other bank and diving into the river. I didn't know that cormorants strayed this far inland from coastal areas, but was told that they come regularly to the Shenandoah during their molting season.

All the folks I met were very congenial, and I will definitely be joining VNPS for more hikes in the future. It's a great way to get to know the many beautiful natural treasures in this area!

Virginia Bluebells (Mertensia virginica)

The Rare Fringed Blue Gentian

Fringed Blue Gentian (Gentianopsis crinita).

This year the Botanical Artists Society National Capitol Region (BASNCR) Annual Exhibition is focusing on native plants. Looking for a native plant to illustrate, I remembered my field sketch and photos of the endangered Blue Fringed Gentian (Gentianopsis crinita) that I had come across a few years back at Soldier's Delight when I lived in that area (see post excellent-adventure-at-soldiers-delight).

I dug the sketch and photos up and chose one I particularly liked, with the seed pods forming and strong side lighting, for the main part of the composition. On the lower right side I added two flowers showing some of their lovely details. The flowers of gentians open fully only in bright sunlight and begin to close as the sun starts to go down.

Following the Fertilized Orchid

Fertilized flower development (on right).

Continuing my observations of orchid fertilization, this is what the developing ovary of the fertilized phalaenopsis hybrid orchid looks like after a couple of weeks plus a few days. The thickening of the inferior ovary with its ridges is very noticeable now, compared with the unfertilized flower on the left. The fertilized flower is losing its color and the petals are fading. A seed pod should develop eventually (orchids are notoriously slow in this respect).

Here is what the front of the fertilized orchid looks like:

Fertilized Phalaenopsis hybrid after approximately one week.

Fertilized Phalaenopsis hybrid after two weeks plus a few days.

Unfortunately, the hand pollination of the other variety of orchid hybrid did not "take" at all--after about ten days those flowers faded and fell off. I figure the pollen grains must not have made proper contact with the stigma, or they were not quite ripe, so the pollen tube did not develop at all. Two days ago I decided to give it another try--this time I separated the two tiny pollen sacs and attached one to the sticky substance on the stigma. The same reaction observed before, of the tips of the tiny "bonnet" on the column closing is starting to take place. Only time will tell if fertilization has been successful this second time.

Blue Gentian: the Finished Painting

Blue Gentian (Gentiana scabra) watercolor, 13.5" x 14.5"

Here at last is the finished painting of the Blue Gentian. This is my entry for Brookside Garden's Botanica 2014 exhibition, which will be on view from June 28-Aug. 8, 2014.

Botanical Observations

Fertilized orchid flower.

In the attempt to better understand the botany of orchids, I decided to hand-pollinate a couple of the orchids I have blooming around the house and observe what happens. I took one of my small painting brushes and detached the two tiny pollen sacs (pollinia) from the anther of one flower and deposited these on the stigma of another (the pollen sacs in the flower above were left intact). The pollen sacs seemed to have a sticky substance that gladly stuck to the stigma. I did this proceedure on two of the flowers of this unnamed species (the mystery hybrid purchased at a Florida roadside stand).

Compare fertilized orchid flower (on left) with unfertilized flower (on right).

About four days later I looked and there were some noticeable differences between the flowers that had been fertilized and the others: the column had subtly changed color and appeared slightly swollen. The next morning I took these photos in bright light to look more closely--voila!

Comparing the fertilized flower on the left with the unfertilized on on the right, the most remarkable change was that the tiny appendages on either side of the column that forms a little bonnet over the anther had moved down to clasp each other and enclose the column. The fake "bee" formation on the labellum that lures and guides the pollinator had withered and lost all coloration, signalling to the prospective bee that the flower was now closed for business.

In fact, the color of the entire labellum had changed to a dark red and the petals and sepals were starting to become papery and thin, another indication the flower would wane soon. I wish I had a microscope-type camera that would allow me to photograph even more closely, perhaps look at a dissected flower to see what is going on inside, but that is beyond my budget at the moment.

Pencil sketch of the two orchid  flowers.

For now, I will content myself observing how the seed pod develops (hopefully one will develop) and recording the process in sketches. And perhaps I'll pollinate some of my other orchids later on, to observe how different species behave. It's so fascinating--no wonder there are so many natural and man-made orchid hybrids!