Helianthus crunch session

Yesterday's botany bender/blast/outing was at Somme Prairie Grove.  I learned something horrible--there are actually four species (at least) of woodland sunflower in the Chicago region, not just Helianthus divaricatus.  I suppose I knew in the back of my mind that these three others--H. strumosus, H. decapetalus, and H. hirsutus--existed, but I figured that since they are distinct species, I would recognize them as being different if I ever saw them.  That's pretty much wrong--at first glance, they all look basically the same.  Even at a second glance, they look basically the same (and I'm still not so sure that they're not actually one species with a wide range of variation).  Luckily, all four "species" exist at Somme Prairie Grove, and site steward Stephen decided to tackle them, with about ten different botanical keys as backup.  The distinctions between them boil down to stem roughness and petiole length/leaf dimension:

1.  H. hirsutus is immediately distinguishable from the others because it is the only one that is rough/hairy all the way down to the bottom of the stem.  They all are (or may be) hairy near the top, but it's the bottom 2/3 that counts.  Unfortunately, it seems that the hairs might sometimes fall off the stem later in the season (of course they would, those little bastards).  In this case, you can tell that they used to be there because there are dark blemishes on the stem.  The leaves have very short or no petioles:

2.  H. divaricatus is the only other one with very short or no petioles, but it is smooth lower down on the stem (can't possibly show the lack of hairiness, but here are the petioles):

3.  H. decapetalus is also smooth lower down on the stem, but has long petioles, often more than 3cm long.  The leaf is generally wide and ovate, less than 3x as long as broad:

It can often be confused with Heliopsis helianthoides...oh, who am I kidding?  They all could, but especially this one because of the wide leaves.  The trick is looking at the bracts under the inflorescence...they're pointy in all Helianthuses (Helianthi?), but rounded or blunt in Heliopsis:

 This is a Helianthus.  Who knows which one.

This is Heliopsis.  Ta-da!

Also, Heliopsis has toothier leaves:

4.  H. strumosus is what they call the "wastebasket" species...it is so variable, that if you can't figure out what species you have, just assume it's H. strumosus.  It is also smooth-stemmed down to the bottom with long petioles, like H. decapetalus, but the leaves are longer and narrower (>3x as long as wide) and petioles are slightly shorter (<3cm) and the leaf tends to taper down to a winged petiole like this:

But not all of the ones that we saw tapered like that, so it's not a definite characteristic.  The photo below shows the allegedly "longer, narrower" leaves.  Nothing you'd ever notice from a galloping horse. 

Lord a-mighty!  Now that we've strained our brains, let's just look at some pretty pictures:

 Agrostis perennans, thin grass.  I've probably walked by this a thousand times thinking it was redtop.

 Brachyeletrum erectum, long-awned wood grass.

 Cirsium altissimum, tall thistle.  Whenever I try to take a picture of the whole plant to show how tall it is, it always turns out like crap.  Backlit and muddled by oak trees in the background.

 Elymus riparius!  I'm finally nailing down these ryes.

 We also learned the difference between tall & late bonesets.  This is Eupatorium altissimum (tall).  Its leaves are long and narrow, and the plant is slightly fuzzy and gray-tinged all over.

 (Even the flowers are fuzzy.)

 This is the leaf of E. serotinum (late boneset).  It's toothier and more egg-shaped.

 Its flowers are sharper-looking and not fuzzy.

 This is allegedly a hybrid between cream and bottle gentians.  Bottle gentian generally blooms much later than this, but it appears to have lent its blue tinge to the cream gentian.

 Hedeoma pulgeoides, pennyroyal, in gorgeous full bloom.  Look at those itty-bitty flowers!  This is one of those plants most people probably just walk right past, because it's tiny and doesn't look like much.

 A-ha.  This is how you can tell Indian grass before it flowers--this distinctive brown ligule that clasps the stem.  I think the narrowing of the leaf blade is also an indicator.

And finally, the state-threatened Tomanthera auriculata, earleaf false foxglove.  The ears are those pointy things on the sides of the leaves.

Solo Bender: Sandy Soil Sites of South Cook

I had nothing on my calendar yesterday, so I took a little tour of the ol' lake plain, checking out some preserves in southern Cook County.  Four of them, to be exact.  Here is the scoop:

#1:  Sand Ridge Nature Center.  One might assume that something called a "nature center" might have some respectable nature in its boundaries.  I am slowly coming to the realization that "nature center" is synonymous with "dump in which your children can run wild without harming anything".  The nicest thing I can say about this place is that it had an indoor bathroom.  Every "natural" area in the joint seemed highly impacted by humans and full of nonnatives.  I set out along the Lost Beach loop trail, figuring hey, it's only two miles, so even if it sucks I'll get some decent exercise and I'll still be out of here in half an hour.  At one point, while still on the spur trail to the loop part of the trail, I stopped and turned around, my skin crawling from the walls of buckthorn and other nasties looming above me, and had to persuade myself to keep going.  I then reached the loop, which had a solid understory of buckthorn.  (For some reason, when I first saw the name "Sand Ridge", I was expecting nice open sand prairie.  Ha ha ha, I'm so naive!).  I turned around for good and got the hell out of there.  Maybe there were actually some nice ancient beach ridges farther along, but I was not going to get my hopes up.  On the way out, I used the bathroom again for good measure.  Take that, FPDCC!  Here are the only decent shots I got:

Phytolacca americana, pokeweed.  It's actually kinda pretty before it becomes a huge bulky purple-berried monster.

Polygonum sagittaria, arrow-leaved tearthumb, with the cartilaginous, retrorse, thumb-tearing prickles evident

#2:  Sand Ridge Nature Preserve.  This is just to the east of the nature center, one of those preserves they don't really label because they don't want you going there.  #39 on my all-time list of Illinois Nature Preserves (that's a tally, not a rank...I can surely think of worse ones).  You can just park at the Burnham Greenway Trail along 184th St. and walk down Campbell Street, which goes right through the preserve.  Then, take a deep breath and plunge into the tall, rank vegetation.  That poor place...the INPC listing has all of these great species listed, but it's been swallowed whole by monstrous hordes of tall goldenrod, purple loosestrife, and cruel brambles.  It would benefit from repeated catastrophic wildfires.  I saw a few prairie species here and there, and there are still oak trees lined up on the old beach ridges; otherwise, you would not be able to tell where they were.  Anyone wishing to visit this place would do well to wear heavy-duty Carhartts, and NOT lightweight, quick-dry zipoffs as I did, unless you wish to be shredded to bits by the brambles.  As I was.  I staggered out of that place with about as much relief as I did the nature center.  Photographic evidence of this arduous journey:

One of the swales between ridges...chock full of purple loosestrife.  Sigh.

 Coreopsis tripteris, or tall coreopsis, with a nice oak ridge in the background.  Just ignore all the tall goldenrod in the low background.

 Spartina pectinata--prairie cord grass.  I love the striping on the sheath.  (And one nice thing I'll say about loosestrife--it forms a nice Monet-like background!)

 Check it out--I ID'd a dodder!  This one is rope dodder, Cuscuta glomerata.  According to Swink & Wilhelm..."This species can be identified at 10 paces by its distinctive appearance as a section of white rope wound in several spiral turns around the stem of its host."  Ah, yep.  That's it.  This dodder was ALL OVER the place, strangling the crap out of the tall goldenrod (but apparently not enough to control it).  Kick some ass, rope dodder!

Here it is again.  It is the ball python of the plant kingdom.

#3:  Zanders Woods.  Dear, sweet Zanders Woods.  The perfect antidote to the previous sites.  The air is always cool and fresh here, and smells better than any other place I know in the Chicago area.  The INPC gives it the rather unpoetic name of Thornton-Lansing Woods, but I prefer the more common FPDCC name.  It sounds like the strumming of a harp.  I didn't spend too much time here, because time was ticking toward Friday rush hour; just enough to check out the little sand prairie opening off the west side of the access road that is always full of delightful things that the FPDCC hasn't managed to neglect to death yet.  I was a little troubled to see a strange infestation in the prairie...common ragweed.  It covered a good third or so of the prairie, which is a pretty rapid colonization--I don't remember seeing it when I was there last, about two years ago.  That's not something one usually sees in high quality areas; usually it sticks to old-fields and roadsides.  But the place was in pretty good shape, otherwise; it had the wonderful problem of being so nice, it was difficult to find places to step.  Here are some of the denizens managing to tough out the drought:

 Aster simplex, panicled aster.  Showing off its panicle.

 Arenaria lateriflora, grove sandwort.  One day, I will get over my fear of technology and figure out how to adjust the exposure so the whites aren't washed out.
This is NOT Arenaria.  I don't do drugs, so maybe someone spiked my food the day I wrote this.  It is a chickweed of some sort, I believe.

Solidago juncea, early goldenrod.  Fireworks!

#4:  Gensburg-Markham Prairie.  It's pretty much gone into shut-down mode: a sea of green and brown, interrupted by a few isolated splashes of yellow from some warrior-like rosinweed and early goldenrod.  I could almost feel them gloating over their less-deeply-rooted neighbors.  Maybe because of this lack of flowers, the few I did see were absolutely swarmed with insects:

 Bull thistle may be a nasty nonnative, but the bugs ain't picky.  They were trembling with joy over these pom-poms.  A big fuzzy bumbler cavorted with a couple of pairs of milkweed bugs in flagrante delicto.  Speaking of which, aren't those bugs just the horniest bugs out there?  I swear I see them more often stuck together in pairs than I see them alone.

A cicada killer cricket hunter (?) on whorled milkweed.  They were all over those like white on rice.  [Someone long ago told me these were cicada killers.  I just looked it up, and cicada killers are actually those fat wasps with stripy abdomens.  I think these blue guys are from the genus Chlorion, based on a quick internet search.]

 All right, I'm pretty sure this is Ludwigia polycarpa, false loosestrife.  I didn't key it out.  I'm sure certain people who work there would be able to tell me.  There was a whole big wetland area near the north side of the loop that was a monoculture of this stuff.  It was a little spooky, honestly.

 I really need to be more diligent about keying stuff out in the field.  I snapped a photo of this, from the man-made ditch along the north side, fairly certain it was large-flowered water plantain, Alisma triviale.  That's because I'm a cocky know-it-all who in actuality knows jack.  Could it really be Sagittaria rigida, stiff arrowhead?  That's what the key leads me to, but it is a C=10 with no voucher specimen in Cook County.  What would it be doing in that slummy place?  Again, employees of IBP, help me out here.

And the grand finale, a big ol' clump of rosinweed singing its lungs out in the afternoon sun!

August doldrums

I haven't gotten out much this month, after the botanical frenzy that was Michigan.  Too many concerts, plays, ballgames, doctor appointments, etc.  It's just not possible to fit an entire summer into a ten-week summer vacation (first world problems, I know).  People who get bored on summer vacation and long to return to school have a crippling lack of imagination and adventure and should be slapped repeatedly.

First outing of note:  botany training session/extravaganza (still haven't come up with a good name) at Harms Woods, with stewards John & Jane Balaban, on August 4.  A long time ago, yes.  I was too ashamed to post anything about it, because I committed the botanical misdemeanor of forgetting my camera at home [hangs head in misery].  It was an especially egregious error in light of a delightful discovery I made--a species of grass never before seen at the site, black-seeded rice grass, Oryzopsis racemosa.  We found a grand total of two plants, on a morainal slope, in an area that had been burned recently.  It is surmised that the plants came from a seed mix donated by the Botanic Garden years ago, and were either overlooked all this time or have been chillin' in the seed bank.  It's a handsome grass, with glossy wide leaves and smooth, shiny black seeds (as you might guess from the name).  You'll have to take my word for it, as I have no photographic evidence.  UPDATE!  Jane sent me one of her photos of the Oryzopsis.  She apologizes for it not being of great quality, as she was in a rush.  I love the graceful arch of the inflorescence.  You can't see the black seeds, because you have to pull the glumes apart first:

Another new species for me was Samolus parviflorus, or water pimpernel.  It is very small and understated, and was tucked away along one of the ditches that crosses the site.  And so you don't get bored, here's a photo of it in the U of Michigan herbarium.  (Dream job alert!  Creating and maintaining a botanical photograph database.  Who are these people, and when are they going to retire?)

The outing was especially helpful for me because I got myself straightened out on how to identify some woodland grasses that have stumping me for reasons unknown....no, that's a lie.  They're not really unknown--I just have no patience for glumes and lemmas and the other infinitesimal parts of grasses and am too lazy to key them out, and have to have a real botanist show them to me in person.  So now, I can remember which rye is which, riverbank vs. virginia (they're really nothing alike, so that's kind of embarrassing); and I have learned Brachyeletrum erectum and Festuca obtusa, a couple of uncommon woodland grasses.  I also learned how to distinguish two of the agrimonies, which heretofore I just lazily called "one of those Agrimonias" and loftily told people that nobody really knew how to tell the difference between any of them.  That is also a lie, apparently.  A. gryposepala is the big coarse-looking one with big fruits and hairs sticking straight out from the stem, and A. pubescens is smaller, more delicate, with appressed hairs.  I am revealing myself as a big liar...hopefully my students will never find this out.  Approximately 20% of what I tell them is pulled out of my ass.

Yesterday was the second outing of note:  seedpicking at Somme Prairie Grove.  For as dormant as everything seems this year, we got a pretty good haul.  Woodland grasses in the savanna area--silky rye, bottlebrush, and woodland brome.  Here are photos of the latter two, not taken yesterday, but gotta keep y'alls entertained:

Then we headed out to the dry prairie and got huge bags of soft, fluffy purple prairie clover and leadplant seeds, and a respectable bag full of New Jersey tea seeds.  For the uninformed, NJT is a nice, short, native prairie shrub that enjoys camouflaging itself amongst resprouts of its evil cousin, common buckthorn, and making it difficult for heroic herbicide applicators to free it from said evil cousin's stranglehold.  I have no photos of my own of this species, but I'm going to borrow some from the U of Wisconsin herbarium and the USDA Plants Database to make my point and absolve me of my guilt for occasionally spraying this nice little shrub with Garlon:

 

This is New Jersey tea.  It's nice.

This is buckthorn.  It's not nice.  

Now, imagine neither plant has flowers or fruits, but just leaves.  Can you see how an innocent herbicide applicator might mistake one for the other, just based on the leaves?  Especially after wading through seas of them, interlaced with each other?  I just want the world to know that I'm sorry.  Tangent concluded.

The prairie, as mentioned, is still pretty dormant as far as flowers go.  It was not very inspiring, plant-wise.  I did, however, catch a couple of insects willing to sit still long enough for me to snap their portraits (identities tentative, as I am a poor entomologist):

 Yellow-legged meadowhawk, male, perching on a purple prairie clover seedhead

 

 My best guess is a sachem skipper, perched on a rattlesnake master seedhead from last year

So there is all that I have done in the first half of August.  Today is ugly and stormy, so I am homebound.  I could use suggestions for a day trip tomorrow.  There will be a botany outing at Somme Prairie Grove on Sunday, and I will not forget my camera this time.

Pure MICHIGAN!

That is Michigan's tourism slogan.  It's pretty applicable to the west coast of Michigan.  Their commercials are very successful in making you think that Michigan is a problem-free paradise.  For the most part, that is what I experienced on my little 3-day jaunt to SW Michigan for some intense R&R.  They almost had me convinced that Michigan is not in dire financial straits and does not have a seriously scary right-wing militia up north.  Almost. 

The base camp was Elizabeth's parents' beach house in South Haven.  I think originally, the vacation was supposed to have a larger cast of characters than just the two of us and her parents, but it turned out great, because we could turn the entire trip into a botany outing without feeling like we were boring the bejeezus out of everyone else.  This beach house has the distinct advantage of being tucked in between the lake and a protected forested wetland area that makes up part of the rear dunes--a no-no for conservation purposes, obviously, but great for convenience purposes.  We spent a few hours exploring the sandy, acidic woods behind the house; in normal years, this place would be a boggy, buggy mess, but this summer nary a drop of surface water was to be seen.  Botanically, it was the best place I've ever seen that's not an official preserve of some kind.  It's just some random patch of woods that all the rich neighbors are probably too scared to set foot in.  Check out all this stuff we found:

 Bartonia virginica, screwstem!  You know when you find something as sparse and boring-looking as this, it has to be good.  Swink & Wilhelm give it a C=10 (very habitat-picky, for all you non-botanists [and congratulations for making it this far, if that applies to you], and even though we were one county away from the technical Chicago Region as defined by S&W, we're going to overlook that).

 Carex crinita!  Not terribly uncommon, but very handsome, no?  Look at those green awns!

 Carex debilis rudgei!  We only found a few individuals.

 Carex intumescens!  This is one of my favorites of the trip.  Like Carex grayi, but stretched out and more graceful.

 Carex lurida!  The aptly-named bottlebrush sedge.

 Carex swanii!  Finally got me a photo.  What a schizophrenic species.  It likes open wet prairies, and sandy boggy woods.  It's endearingly fuzzy and cute in both places. 

 We Chicago residents don't get to see this one a whole lot--American beech.  (Any readers from the East are yawning at this point.)

 The strangely named marsh purslane, Ludwigia palustris.  It ain't a purslane.  But just look at those handsome little four-sided flowers!

 Running club moss.  It's endangered in Illinois, but apparently not such a big deal in Michigan.  And it's a little blurry.  So sue me, it refused to situate itself in good lighting conditions.

 Trailing club moss.  If someone could tell me why it's trailing, I would appreciate it.

 We're pretty sure this is Lycopus rubellus.  The key for Lycopuses (Lycopi?) is unnecessarily difficult.  It was hanging out all around the bases of trees in the middle of the swampy woods...or again, what would be swampy in a normal year.

Rubus hispidus--swamp dewberry.  It's not out of focus; I'm trying to show you the hispid-ness of the stem.  Quit your whining.

And the grand finale--AMERICAN CHESTNUT!!!  For the uninformed, this tree used to be a major component of the Eastern forest canopy until the chestnut blight wiped it out early in the 1900s.  It now exists in a few isolated pockets, and as little shrubby stumps that are too small for the blight to infect.  We found TWO double-trunked adult trees (sadly, both of which looked like they are a little worse for the wear) hanging out nonchalantly at the crests of the rear dunes.  Who knows how they got there.

And they're producing seeds!!!

And we found a little seedling, so they're reproducing!

Pretty good for some random, non-named woods, eh?  Then we headed up to Saugatuck Dunes State Park.  The dunes were not as diverse as some I've seen, such as Miller Dunes or Indiana Dunes, but they did have some good stuff:

 Calamovilfa longifolia, sand reed grass, which I've seen many places, but it's pretty difficult to get a good shot of it.  The jack pines made a good dark background.

 Chimaphila maculata, or spotted wintergreen.  One of those boreal remnants.

 Partridgeberry.  Too bad it's too early for the bright red berry--they look pretty snazzy in the fall.

 

Polygonella articulata--jointweed.  This was the only individual we saw in the whole place.

 Also, some weird circus lichens!

 And a puffball mushroom that looks like an alien pod just biding its time until it swarms the planet!  The mushroom guide calls these "earthstars".  

And that was our trip!  Yes, it also involved floating in the Lake Michigan waves and mojitos, but who wants to hear about that?