A Tale of Two Irises

Dwarf Crested Iris, Iris verna

Dwarf Violet Iris, Iris verna

Shawnee State forest has two native Iris species that live in upland woods- not wetlands.  These two species are relatively frequent along the roads of Shawnee State forest and may be my favorite plants in the forest.  I'm just so fascinated by Irises that live in upland woods, rather than wetlands.  Aren't they cool?  I like the dwarf crested iris so much that I purchased a nice one gallon pot from Scioto Gardens last year that is quickly spreading in my backyard wildflower garden.  I could photograph these over, and over, and over again.

Tom

Flora-quest Isn't Only Flowers

Ringneck Snake, Diadophis punctatus

Although Flora-Quest is a celebration of the late spring Flora of Shawnee State Park and Forest, Cheryl allows us to look at other things too.  Shawnee State Forest has quite possibly the state's most interesting reptile and amphibian populations, and during the weekend I was able to photograph these charasmatic herptiles.

Mole salamander larva, possibly a spotted salamander, Ambystoma maculata.

Northern Slimy Salamander, Plethodon glutinosus

-Tom

Pink Lady Slipper

Pink Lady Slippers, Cypripedium acaule

As you may have guessed, it's Shawnee week!  After spending Flora-quest weekend at Shawnee State Forest and State Park, I've got plenty of images of amazing plants and animals to share.  I hope you enjoy!

Tom

 

Two Tiger Swallowtails

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail, Papilio glaucus

Shawnee State Forest, May 1, 2011

Shawnee Smilax

On our recent visit to Shawnee State Park and Forest over the labor day weekend, I tried to climb a ridge one evening to get a clear view of the sunset. I was unable to find a clear view of the western sky, so I set up Megan's Canon SX20 is on my tripod to take an image of the interior of the forest.

Shawnee's dry ridgetop forests are often blanketed with the tangling vines of greenbriars (Smilax species). Thank goodness for trails, because you don't want to walk through a patch of these without thick pants.

Why was I shooting with Megan's camera? I forgot my wide angle lens for the trip! Megan's SX20 has a nice wide angle/telephoto zoom, so that is what I brought with me on my evening photo adventure. For this shot, I captured 8 different exposures, and combined them using Photomatix Pro. This technique of taking varying exposure information from multiple photographs and squishing it all together into one photograph is called High Dynamic Range photography, or now simply known as HDR. It's a technique that is evolving- many point and shoot cameras can create this type of image without extra software.

Some have scoffed at HDR while others love it- it is certainly a polarizing topic in photography. To me, it is another tool in the box of camera goodies that I have at my disposal. And for something like the interior of a forest, at sunset, with bright highlights and very dark shadows, using HDR imaging allows me present an image of what my eyes actually saw better than a single photograph would have allowed.

-Tom

Images of Shawnee

 

Our trip to Shawnee State Park and Forest, September 4-6th, 2010.

Tom

Blue Mistflower, Conoclinium coelestinum

Check out TA Photography for a MUCH  larger image.

I'm sitting  in our basement after returning from a quick visit to Shawnee State Park.  Although we were only gone two nights, it actually seemed longer- we felt like we really had a great family getaway.  I photographed mostly in the early morning and evenings- just a few things here and there that I will share over the next week.  Shawnee is a spectacular wonderland that abounds with nature- I can't get enough- and it certainly beats our basement!

Tom

More from Flora-Quest 2010

Tom-  Just enjoy-  They're all native plants-  Shawnee is spectacular.

Flora-quest 2010 is O-vah!

I think a great time was had by all, in spite of the rainy conditions-  I know I had a blast.  The Shawnee State Forest really was dripping with warblers and the forest floor was covered with blooms- it did not dissapoint.  See you in 2011!

Tom

If anyone knows more about these flies that flock to wild geraniums, I'd love to know more-  I've been observing this behavior each spring for several years now-  their must be some really great nectar down there at the base of the flower!

Shawnee- Baby Herps and an Orange Orchid- Camera Critters

Almost one week ago, I started this little adventure to Shawnee State Forest with the Ohio Heritage Naturalists, so I better finish it up- I'm sure most of you forgot where we left off- with the Liatris aspera, a beautiful blazing star.

We walked down and back a grassy forest trail that was full of the liatris, when I spotted a few of our naturalists on their knees, hunched over looking at something. Sure enough, it was a tiny, newly hatched five-lined skink, with a bright blue tail. We saw several of these tiny lizards throughout our adventure. Ray was kind enough to hold the skink for the camera.

I had noticed that not all of our naturalists joined us for this little side trip. Mind you, it was getting ridicuously hot by this point, and the humidity was up there as well. Jason and Weedpicker Cheryl said that it was actually cooler on the ground in this position. I'll let them explain it, but they were lined up like they were going somewhere on an imaginary roller coaster ride or something like that. I snapped the picture quickly, they were up and with us again in a flash.

Ahh, the beautiful view from picnic point. From this vantage, theOhio valley can be seen- Ohio on the left, and Kentucky on the right. You can just barely make out the river city of Portsmouth, Ohio, now a shadow of its once former self. It actually was home to a National Football League Franchise called the Portsmouth Spartans. The team left for Detroit in 1934- they're now known as the Detroit Lions.

In addition to the grand vistas, there was plenty of interest at a much smaller level at picnic point. A tiny eastern fence lizard was basking on one of our van's Goodyear tires. The "r" in Goodyear gives quite a size reference- these newly hatched lizards were really, really little.

Jenny Richards, the naturalist at Shawnee State Park, found several other eastern fence lizards, and as I promised Kelly, here she is holding one of these little reptiles. I'm sure we could have found many more, but we needed to pack up our vans and head back to Columbus.

However- We couldn't miss the opportunity to stop and see this botanical wonder- the yellow fringed orchid, thanks again to Jenny. I've seen this species one other time, I believe, in the Oak Openings west of the Toledo. What an amazing plant. More orange than yellow, it was a great way to end our day of botanizing and naturalizing.

Tom

See what we found during the first part of our Shawnee Trip

This is my Camera Critters post for this week.

Welcome to Shawnee

This past Wednesday, I traveled with my botanical sensei, Rick Gardner, and several of the Ohio Natural Heritage Naturalists to the Shawnee State Park and State Forest region near Portsmouth. What a great time we had. We headed to a place called picnic point, all 20 or so of us, to check out some of the interesting plants that grow along the forest roadsides. Yes, roadsides. Many of the rare plants at Shawnee like disturbance, and therefore, are home along the steep cuts of the narrow forest roads.


One of the first plants we ecountered was Eupatorium album, white thoroughwort. Although this species is listed as potentially threatened in Ohio, I heard Rick say "i've only seen this a few times in my life". You just don't hear Rick say those things very much!

The natural habitat on the ridge tops in the picnic point area is comprised of species that can tolerate the acidic, dry habitat. In the photo above is blackjack oak, Quercus marilandica on the left, and Pitch Pine, Pinus rigida, on the right. The only time I see these species is when I travel to the extreme southern dry ridges of our great State.


Other woody species we observed included chestnut oak, Quercus prinus, and black gum, Nyssa sylvatica, among others.


The understory of the open forest was covered with huckleberries, blueberries, and greenbriar. My legs were scraped up after we walked through this stuff- I should have been wearing my jeans instead of my lightweight nylon hiking pants.

Butterflies are always plenty whenever I travel south. Although the day wasn't particularly "lep-ful", this hackberry butterfly did enjoy sucking my sweat from my hat. It stuck around for several minutes.
Here you can see our illustrious group. You may even recognize a few folks.

Rick is the leader of the trips, and it doesn't go unnoticed. How many other botanists get fanned by a giant leaf when they begin to perspire? Unfortunately, this was the leaf of a nasty non-native species, princess tree, Paulownia tomentosa.

If you're a gardener, you may recognize this plant. Its relatives in the genus Ageratum are commonly used in the nursery trade. Pictured above is our native blue mistflower, or Conoclinium coelestinum, formerly placed in the genus Eupatorium. This species is also used as a garden plant.

Take a close look at this one. Yes, this is a blazing star, but this is Liatris aspera. I wonder why I haven't seen this species in the garden trade like spiked blazing star, a native that almost anyone that has hung around a suburban yard in the past ten years might recognize?

Shawnee is always a interesting place, with fascinating flora and fauna. And this trip didn't disappoint, with some particularly cute creatures running all over the place- But that will have to wait to tomorrow. Megan just brought down some great homemade salsa from our homegrown tomatoes. But we don't have any chips- time for a quick run to Kroger!

Tom

The Power of Collective Naturalizing III- Shawnee State Forest

What a fantastic day of naturalizing at Shawnee yesterday! Here are just a few of the very interesting things that we came across. As always, if you recognize something, no matter how basic, feel free to chime in and tell us a little piece of information, or maybe even put an I.D. on something. As always, in this list, there are things that I knew right off the bat, things I had and still have a general idea about, others I learned, and there are still things that are yet to be solidly identified. So here we go, here was our day at Shawnee, a state forest and park system about 2 hours south of Columbus, a few miles west of the Ohio River city of Portsmouth.

*****(It's Monday Night, and I'm going to write some updates and maybe give a few HINTS!)****

1. Kathleen correctly identified the biologists in this photo, with their floppy hats and all, but what is that shrub they are looking at? One clue: It has opposite leaves. Second clue: It is on the Ohio Rare Plant List.

2. I thought someone may have gotten this one by now! I know it by two common names, any guesses here?
3. Kathleen correctly ID'd the eastern tent caterpillar, which I learned on this trip from John Howard, an incredible naturalist from Adams County.
4. Yes, this one is in the pink family. I'm getting hot we're so close. Its starting to smoke!
5. Any ideas what family this plant may be in? Kylee, are you out there? You can't buy this one at Kroger or any garden center near you. Ok..I'm outta here, but I've given a few clues, more to come tomorrow.
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