Hamilton Wetlands and Forest

  It was a pleasantly cool day to visit the Wetlands and Forest.  The woods are not yet fully recovered from the summer's drought, but they are looking fresher. Although some mosses still look very dry, fresh growth is increasing, along with fungi and slime molds. Witches' butter and staghorn jelly fungus have appeared. Tiny fungi (still to be identified) emerge from the moss. As we studied the fungi, a new (to us) western hemlock appeared just off the path. The water level in the Marsh is up slightly after the past week's rain. There is definitely more open water visible. We heard frogs, but none were visible, and the dragonfly population appears to be dwindling. The Marsh's fringes looked refreshed by the rain. The toxic water hemlock (no relation to the conifer in the forest) is bearing seeds. As we left the Forest, we could see that the woodpecker persists in sculpting his stump. And a red squirrel had made a substantial meal from a fir cone, but hadn't tidied u...

 The Wetlands and Forest will undoubtedly experience more hot days, but today showed evidence that the summer may be winding down.  There is rain in the forecast--not a minute too soon, as the foliage and mosses all are alarmingly dry. The leaves and branches of red osier dogwood beside the path show the effects of drought--the leaves are drying, and the colour of the branches is fading. A mossy nurse log, nurturing huckleberry saplings, shows drying moss along its sides. For reasons that might bear investigation, slime molds and fungi seem to be doing well despite the heat and dryness.  A dog vomit slime mold looks as though it's  about to take off to explore its environment, putting out  fibres from its central aggregate of cellular matter. These conks are growing energetically. A small jelly fungus (which needs further identification) is the first we've seen this season. The "Irish harp" beside the path is gradually becoming obscured by cattail moss. Cascara ...

  A kind person wrote a much-appreciated comment for last week's blog, remarking that there is always something worth observing along the path into the wetlands and forest.  Today was certainly no exception.   The weather has cooled, somewhat.  The skies were grey, and the light was softened.   Along the path, the bracken fern is dry, and other vegetation is drying. Just off the path, we discovered a stand of ghost pipe--drying to black, but with white fruit forming. These rare plants are what Pojar and Mackinnon's Plants of Coastal British Columbia  list under "Oddballs."  They lack chlorophyll, and are in their early stages a ghostly white. Photo from Turner Photographics They were once thought of as saprophytic, but are actually mycotrophic--as they lack chlorophyll, they draw their nutrition from the network of mycorrhizal fungi linked with the area's trees.      We had not found these rare and striking plants while they we...

  Each season has its own beauty.  In the height of summer, there is a  fine stillness, even a gravity, in the Forest. Occasional birdsong persists, as do the comments of ravens, but it lacks the vigor of springtime.  Perhaps, faced with the season's heat and dryness, it's conserving energy. It is very dry.  Mosses are showing the season's change. Last week, the foamflower was producing seeds.  This week, the seeds are more developed.   In their  Plants of Coastal British Columbia, Pojar and MacKinnon describe this stage in the plant's life cycle:  "few-seeded capsules borne horizontally, open by splitting between the upper valve and the lower valve to form structures that  resemble sugar scoops (authors' emphasis) seeds smooth, black, shining."  Seeds are yet to appear.  We shall monitor.  The most recent woodpecker stump continues to show the work of its avian sculptors. Meanwhile, the remains of the original w...