McDowell Park 4/15

[howard bruner]

The forest floor layers from malachite and emerald to lacy shades of jade.  Flowers float in and on this precious sea.  A slight breeze is enough to flip delicate plants over as it moves like a wave up the trail.

 

Every tangled batch of salmonberry sports a frantic chirping hummingbird – almost comically darting from flower to flower so fast I cannot imagine much nectar making it into the bird.  Pileated woodpeckers haunt the canyon with screams while black-throated gray warblers buzz closer to the ground. 

 

An amazing discovery hides under the canopy of the herbs – thick and furrowed strap leaves of a species that we located last March in just one small population.  Now that the mature leaves are visible I realize we were walking by the fetid adder’s tongue (Scoliopus hallii) throughout the extent of the trail system.  Several floras remark it is seldom seen and I can verify it is almost magically invisible until you recognize the post-flowering plant (photos 10 and 11). 

 

Other photos:

1) Golden-gilled Gerronema

2) Wood Sorrel under bleeding heart

3) Salmonberry

4) Twisted stalk

5) Half-white carpet moth

6) Fringe cup

7) Trillium with inside-out flower

8) Trillium on the cliffs of Royal Falls

9) Saucer Mitella

10) Adder’s tongue on March 1

11) Adder’s tongue on April 15

 

H