This month I simply couldn’t pick just a few observations from among the wild, slithering, blooming, popping, shrieking chorus of emergence happening all around us, so buckle up for some phenology, friends!
5/6/24 ~ Esopus, NY: Eastern red columbine is another of those lovely woodland ephemeral wildflowers we touched on last month, and it was on full display this week everywhere I walked. Its lobed foliage and delicate stems almost remind me of maidenhair ferns, and are very beautiful all on their own. Like Dutchmen’s breeches and nasturtiums, the distinctive “spurred” petals are nectar reservoirs, meaning bees & hummingbirds really have to get their faces in there (collecting copious pollen in the process) to consume it.
5/6/24 ~ Esopus, NY: Poison ivy leaves are emerging! This is great, both for one of our important native plants and for humans who like to stray a bit into woodland areas. All parts of PI contain urushiol (the rash-inducing oil), but it’s far easier to identify (and thus steer clear of) its leaves than its woody twigs. I’ve photographed it here growing in vine form, intertwined with its lookalike, Virginia creeper. VC has five leaves rather than three, and its mature vines are relatively smooth rather than hairy.
5/6/24 ~ Esopus, NY: Dryad’s saddle, aka pheasant’s back for the feathery patterning on fresh specimens, is one of the first edible mushrooms to emerge each year. It has a double life, sometimes starting as a parasite on hardwoods and ending as an efficient decomposer.1 It’s often thought of as a consolation prize when no morels are too be found, as they share a season, but its taste is controversial. It wafts an incredibly strong scent of cucumbers that carries through as a flavor. The texture is nicely spongy when perfectly fresh, but frankly woody at any other stage—if found later in the season, definitely avoid! The white/creamy pores on its spore surface (underside) are roughly angular, closer to honeycomb than dots. (Side note: the cooked mushrooms are not the same as the one pictured in the other photos—I try not to steal from/share meals with slugs!)
5/6/24 ~ Esopus, NY: I’ve taken note field chickweed before in its short blossoming moment, as it’s quite pretty and not profuse enough to become background, but this is the first time I’ve noticed its smell—thanks allergy medicine! Its not overly strong, lovely and sweet enough to match the flowers. Not to be confused with several introduced plants that share the name chickweed, Cerastium arvense is a native wildflower2 that can make a nice addition to sandier gardens or rocky borders without fear of it growing out of hand.
5/6/24 ~ Esopus, NY: If you have any vernal pools on your radar, give them a visit for the joy of tadpolessssss! And frogs! Based on my (admittedly limited) experience from trying and failing to be a frog mom last year, I believe the tadpoles pictured are wood frogs, while the adults I tried to sneak up on to photograph (with only limited success) were green frogs. It was very joyful to visit this year and see the pool near its full size, since last year it evaporated entirely. Here’s hoping all these overnight rainstorms will help keep these lil’ aquatic angels in plentiful pond scum until they reach maturity.
5/7/24 ~ Rosendale, NY: Ostrich ferns have feathered out in all their enormous, electric green glory. I’m still very much learning my ferns, but Matteuccia struthiopteris is usually quite striking due to size—drifting waist-high or even larger in ideal conditions. I always feel like I’m in a dinosaur’s forest walking through an ostrich fern-dominated understory, though in fact they are a considerably scaled-down fern3 that emerged in the Paleocene age (directly following the meteoric demise of the Cretaceous dinos & associated flora). For foragers, the sight of unfurled ostrich foliage signals that the season for edible fern fiddleheads is officially over in our area.
5/7/24 ~ Rosendale, NY: Being a recovering arachnophobe, I try to be mindful of presenting photos of animals that a large number of people are phobic of…so I’m sorry to y’all who will hate this one, but I was thrilled to catch sight of this young garter snake (Thamnophis sirtalis) and hear many of its kin this week. Earlier in the season (even sometimes in winter!) you can find snakes sunbathing on warm rocks, but I think of it as a good marker of warm soil temperatures when I encounter them out and about in the fully shaded understory. It also bears saying (though I completely understand that irrational fears are just that—irrational) that garter snakes, like the vast majority of snakes in the Hudson Valley, are shy and essentially harmless to humans. If you’re a vole or grasshopper on the other hand, look out…
5/7/24 ~ Rosendale, NY: I’m going to leave us here, with my first ~morel~ find of the year! I found a handful, most of which were far past prime and a couple of which were just getting started. It didn’t count as dinner, but it was proof of concept. If you have spots to check, now is the time! If you don’t know where to start, I’ll be doing a morel deep dive next week, stay tuned~
P.S. The glaring omission to the entries above would have to be the magnificent multitudes of ~~~BIRDS~~~ migrating through our skies these nights and visiting our tree canopies these days. But unfortunately, out of the dozens of different bird species I recorded and identified with my Merlin app this week, representing surely hundreds of individual birds, the only one I managed to see for long enough to take a (blurry) photo of was a honkin’ turkey vulture. In fact, I’d like to present an an adjacent theory to the “bird’s aren’t real” conspiracy that I’m calling “warblers are invisible.” Would love to be wrong, but only time (and possibly a new glasses prescription) will tell.
https://www.mushroomexpert.com/polyporus_squamosus.html
https://www.fs.usda.gov/wildflowers/plant-of-the-week/cerastium_arvense.shtml
https://www.fossilera.com/fossils/9-4-cretaceous-petrified-tree-fern-tempskya-round-utah#:~:text=Tempskya%20is%20a%20genus%20of,petioles%20growing%20between%20adventitious%20roots.
CORRECTION: Thanks to reader Sharon for setting me straight--the blurry bird is a black vulture, not turkey vulture! I realize the black head should have tipped me off, but I didn't even know there another species of vulture in our area. Gotta get back on my Birds of Ulster Co checklist... https://jbnhs.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Checklist_Birds_UC_2014.pdf