Toxic and Psychoactive

I'm sure many of you will have guessed that yesterday's close up was of a mushroom. This is the poisonous Amanita muscaria var guessowii, or yellow fly agaric mushroom, native to North America.

Do NOT eat one of these! Despite being both toxic and hallucinogenic, it is quite a beautiful fungus to look at.

 As it grows, the rounded cap becomes convex and then eventually flattens out.

Out of Context

This looks like barnacles on a smooth surface to me - what do you think it is?

More tomorrow ...

Novae Angliae Shout Out

Our New England aster, Symphyotrichum novae-angliae, is a stunning fall bloom that explodes with color when many are fading.

Pollinators find them pretty irresistible. They're a valuable late season food source for pollinators, and they are gorgeous to look at, so why not plant some?

The leaf bases have a distinctive way of wrapping around the stem, having auricles (lobes) that extend around the lightly hairy stem.

Smoke on the Water (Again)

Nothing much beats September scenes with a mug of hot coffee and a throw blanket around me to start the day ...

 

... being joined by a furry friend is an extra bonus,

as is ending the day with incredible stillness after a deluge of much-needed rain.

 

Sunny and Cheery

It was such a delight to come across these brightly blooming nodding beggarticks (also called bur-marigold) by the water's edge - they look so summery for September!

They grow in wetlands, and are a cheery sight to see when most other blooms have passed.

Bidens cernua, of the aster family: perfection!

Juxtaposition

Juxtaposed int'rest

Angular stones, round puffballs

Man made, natural.

Ladies Tresses in the Bog

Wow! Am I excited to have found this wild orchid known as nodding ladies tresses, Spiranthes cernua, in our lake.

It's a fascinating bog plant, commonly known to flower between August and November. I've visited this site many times, at different times of the year, and yet this is the first time I've seen them. Was I not ready to take it in previously (overloaded with other new species), or were they not growing here before? They are a successional species, so it's described as 'fickle' - maybe that's why?

They're glossy like sugar-coated buns when you examine them up close in the sun.

September Swirls

Mist swirls and rises

(Like humpbacks' net of bubbles) -

Currents caused by warmth.

 

Rooting About

I'm told that many of you know me well enough not to roll your eyes when you hear me wax lyrical about esoteric subjects such as aquatic plant root differences and such. That's just Debbie, you will say, so here goes with my latest fascination ...

Over the years, I've casually noticed that the roots of our native Myriophyllum verticillatum (whorled water milfoil) on Lake Arrowhead seemed to be different from those of the non-native M. heterophyllum (variable water milfoil) but I've never had concordance from others about this being a known feature despite having remarked on this to quite a few people, nor have I found anything about it in the literature.

As my explorations on the lake are coming to a close with our proposed move, I decided to investigate for myself to satisfy my own burning curiosity, and this is what I have noticed:

The roots on M. verticillatum do not have a branched, filamentous and fibrous look to them - they are mostly single unbranched strands only. I also noted that specimens of M. verticillatum slide very easily out of the substrate as a complete, intact sample, but M. heterophyllum roots require a lot more tugging and manipulation to free them.

M. verticillatum roots

M. heterophyllum roots

Whorled milfoil plant and roots on left and variable milfoil plant and roots on right

As you can see from the two samples, there IS a difference, and this might be even easier to use in the field than counting the number of leaves per whorl and the number of leaflet pairs per leaf, especially since there is overlap between the two.

A single rootlet strand of whorled milfoil (L) next to a single strand of variable milfoil (R)

I'm excited about this - to me, it's a discovery of something undocumented!

Fragile Eggs

 

These fragile, hairlike threads on my outdoor wicker chair appear to be lacewing eggs that will grow up to be an insect with net-like wings.

Solitary Together

I spent a wonderful 5 and a half hours of solitude on the lake in glorious fall temperatures last week. Much to my delight I was able to spend time with a Solitary sandpiper, Tringa solitaria. What a quiet, sublime beauty it is!

Much as I wanted to get closer for a better photo, I was loathe to disturb it, knowing how much I love my solitude. These were what I settled for in order to appreciate its solitariness.

Humbled

Peltandra virginica, the green arrow arum, had me totally flummoxed whilst surveying a new pond. I am humbled ... I automatically assumed I was looking at an arrowhead, Sagittaria spp, and breezed past without giving it a second glance even after a friend queried it with me. There's always something new to learn, and it's always worth taking a second look!

Isn't this a beautiful pattern?

Since learning about this species, I have found it in one location on our lake, which pleases me greatly.

It's a pity there were no distinctive flowers to photograph (very unlike the Sagittaria blooms), so the leaves will have to do. They're much waxier, thick and robust, forming dense fleshy stands.

This is what I confused it with! But now I know better, and can see how distinctively different the veins are, for starters. Never assume!

It's always exciting to learn something new. It makes me feel as if I'm getting to know my planet better and more intimately.

Natural Buffers

This is what happens during a rainstorm when shorelines are cleared of native plantings, leaves, twigs and duff - without these kinds of obstructions, rainfall runs across the surface as overland flow with nothing to slow it down. 

The water then cuts downwards as it drops and hits the groun below, creating rills in the sediment.

Even having a small buffer of lawn in between a sloping paved driveway and the lake is not enough to slow it down and dissipate the energy so it can be absorbed into the soil.

The displaced sand and lawn-accoutrements (fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides) then end up in the lake.

Natural buffers and shorelines absorb the energy of the water before it becomes overland flow. Water can then soak down into the ground. With the lake level low, the exposed shoreline we see is not dissected with rills from water running down from above.

Keep your shorelines natural!

Ballistochory

This little beauty disperses its seeds using a very specialized mechanism called ballistochory, or ballochory (as in ballistics!). It explosively releases its seeds when the valves on the seed pod curl back rapidly when touched or brushed upon. The violent ejecting of its contents is also known as explosive dehiscence (a useful new scrabble word?). This rapid catapulting of seeds away from the parent plant is similar to what American witch hazel does - great for seed dispersal.

The common name for this plant is spotted touch-me-not (Impatiens capensis) and its favored by hummingbirds and bumblebees.

The sap is also a natural remedy for poison ivy and other skin rashes.

Things Happen in Threes

People say things happen in threes, so I guess having experienced four downers in a day, we're DONE for a while ... or does it mean we've just started the next three and there are two more disappointments yet to come? And, granted, these are 'luxury' downers to have:

• Our dream property in the UK is turning out not to be a good investment and we must look elsewhere: there appear to be water rights and problems with the shared spring (which also dries up sometimes in summer), the house is too shaded to benefit from solar panels, and the protected bat inhabitants of the carport may not be shut off from their abode (so no adding garage doors and sealing the building from rodents, and creating a workshop etc.)

• The tenants of our Massachusetts home did not prepare the house well for our recent Open House - there were damp towels and laundry lying around, dirty dishes in the sink, the cat litter box hadn't been emptied, and there were hairs lying in the sink. (They also reported a leak in some plumbing that they did themselves, now asking us to repair it!). So far not a single bite on the house, and the tenants haven't found a place to move to ...

• A potential buyer of our current lake paradise informed us they wouldn't be able to afford to buy our property as previously thought, despite it being perfect in every way. We'd really felt happy they would be the ideal stewards of our special nature space.

• This is the worst one of the day - I feel so betrayed and affronted. Our Chelmsford neighbor of many years, to whom we initially offered our MA home, and which she turned down (she owns the houses on either side of ours), and who has always given the concerted impression of being a good, dependable friend, visited our home during both Open Houses (sending her partner separately to one of them). They were very rude to our realtor, both coming in with an attitude, harrumphing and complaining that the house is overpriced, the deck is unsafe and needs to be ripped up, and that the finished downstairs room isn't heated (which it is), so it shouldn't be listed as a bedroom. What business is it of theirs how we list and price our home? They turned it down when offered, and now they're coming round to see what's on offer? I suspect they're trying to get us to believe we should lower the price so they can buy it (she has admitted to having "stolen" the neighboring house from the previous owner). Last month she had hosted us to a sumptuous 'for old time's sake' dinner in her home, and begged us to have dinner with her again before we leave for the U.K. Charming! And then she turns around and tries to undermine our sale of the house. That's not what friends do; it's what vultures do!

Trying to think and be calm with this serenity around me

Grateful for Gratiola

A blooming Gratiola aurea - wow! I've only seen these flowers a few times despite it being a very common plant and having looked out for the blooms for a long time. It's also known as golden pert or hedge hyssop.

We see the leaves and stems everywhere, all over the lake, but seldom are we out and about at the same time as the flowers are. Small flying insects seem to find them attractive too.

Actually, when I say I've been looking out for them for a long time, I've actually only been aquaticizing (!) for 5 years, but I've seen so many unusual and uncommon things in that time, that missing something so ordinary and common on a regular basis seems weird. So proud of my 5 year certificate of involvement with the Lake Stewards of Maine 😃 - many of the volunteers have service awards that span decades, and I'm just starting!

Bumbling Along

I wondered why this bottle gentian had a black center, and then realized it was a bumblebee enjoying some nectar that it had worked hard to reach. The flowers around it show how tightly closed the petals usually are.

      

 

Once the bee has left, the flower shuts closed again, making it only available to bumblebees that are strong enough to force the petals apart. Smaller insects don't get to enjoy the feast - an understated "Bumblebees Only" sign.

Nature's Trellis

Look at how beautifully tree roots work to hold the soil and shoreline slope in place - this is more obvious to us with the lake level being down for so long.

This is natural beauty that we seldom see

Pipewort Display

I noticed what looked like a cluster of small snowballs in the grasses at the water's edge, which was really curious in September, so I just had to get closer ...  it was a delightful meadow of seven angled pipeworts (Eriocaulon aquaticum)

The common name describes the beautiful 7-angled spiral of the flower stem - if you look closely at the pic below, you can see the lines in the green stem forming a gentle twist.

The ball of whitish flowers reminds me of the Math construction kit called Zometool

Don't these look like pipeworts to you? The rods also have twists to them!

Prepping for Winter

Winter buds begin -

Tightly packed, encased in gel

To burst forth in  spring.

Birch Fungus

I often come across fallen birches and their associated polypores when I'm out paddling. Fomitopsis betulina bursts from the bark of a weakened tree that's been compromised through stresses (drought being one of them). The infection possibly gets in through wounds and broken branches, and then lies in wait until the time is ripe for its activation, breaking down the wood.

 

It looks like a large hoof has formed on the tree. Many insects feed on and breed in the fruit body.

According to Wikipedia, this is the fungus that "was carried by "Ötzi the Iceman" – the 5,300 year old mummy found in Tyrol, with speculation that the fungus may have been used as a laxative to expel whipworm."

Coneflower Attraction

A spiral array,

Exquisite echinacea

Draws insects inwards.

Faltering in Fall

I think I'm running out of steam ...  All my observations seem to be of things I've already posted about in the past (boring)! Maybe it's time to move on ... new species and new environments await ...

In the meantime, my native garden is ever colorful. Enjoy!