For some reason this link (and indeed everything to do with ohiodnr) gets me a 404 error. I tried a second browser, but got the same result, so I’m assuming it’s a regional thing (ie, from the UK in this case). Anyways, I see there is a wiki page for the State Park, so I’ll take the liberty of adding it as a backup.
j
Wakehurst prairie update:
First, another shot of early plant growth. This is actually from a visit on Friday (sorry, we’ve had a busy weekend):
Second - they have put up a new sign; and things now become much clearer:
Damn - cropped by google again. Click the picture for the full image. SO: there are actually THREE types of prairie being grown in Wakehurst (!). I was previously unaware of this, so I think my photos have been exclusively Atlantic Coastal Plain. I didn’t have time on Friday to figure out the locations of each prairie type and take photos - that’s a job for the next visit. Plus I suspect they would be hard to distinguish at this time of the year - though having said that, the reed-like plants I had noticed (eg see photo in this post, full image, one tenth in from right, two tenths in from top) are presumably bluestem grass, specific to ACP.
One of the things that kept me busy this weekend was spending today on the south coast, including a couple of hours up on the Downs near Beachy Head. Note to self - chalk grassland - a habitat rich in specialized plants - one to get around to later in the spring.
Finally, I can’t compete with the severe cold @Broomstick had to contend with when when she took her prairie photos; but on Friday I did get snowed on. Sheesh.
j
Well, I had to smile when you described it as “severe” cold. Sure, we call it cold (for spring) but if it was mid-winter that would be considered on the warm side.
My area has much greater temperature swings than yours. I’ve been out when its -33C (now that is cold!) and when it’s +42C (which is very hot).
We’ve been having morning frosts and light overnight snows all this week, with daytime high temperatures near +5 C.
Wakehurst prairies update!
OK, so now I have new information that three types of prairie are being recreated at Wakehurst - and here is the first comparison between the three (key in post 42). Working from east to west (and rather cutely, that’s the way they’ve been laid out at Wakehurst):
Atlantic Coastal Prairie
South Central Prairie
Pacific Northwest Prairie
Well, differences between the three are definitely starting to emerge. You can figure some of it out from the aforementioned key - for example, miniature lupins in PNW.
For those with familiarity with - uh - the originals, any observations/comparisons you have to make would be interesting. Shout out to @Broomstick - how’s South Central looking?
Now that divergences between the areas are becoming obvious, I’ll try to accost a gardener and engage them in conversation. Thing is, a nearby one is hard to spot. What do you actually do to a prairie? Ans: not much; they’re all busy weeding the walled garden and so forth.
j
Elsewhere on the Wakehurst estate, this is how their wetland area is doing.
The reed beds have really sprung into new life. Reed beds as a specific habitat have been on my mind since we last visited Knepp. They have huge reed beds, and a board discussing how (amongst other things) they are important for eel conservation. And that started me thinking about a number of places I go where there are still extensive reed beds. See post 18 for an example - I may take a couple more photos over the summer. (BTW - anyone wants to be the swamp correspondent? Jump right in (heh))
Anyway, local to me reed beds have declined This document (spoilered link - PDF) [spoiler]https://dnu7gk7p9afoo.cloudfront.net/create-and-manage-reedbeds-2.pdf[/spoiler] discusses reed beds, including how to make your own.
j
For a different sort of habitat, there are the vernal pools on Enchanted Rock
Enchanted Rock is the second oldest exposed rock in the US. It’s basically a giant solid granite rock about 145 tall.
At the top of the hill, there are pits in the granite. Some of these pits have accumulated small amounts of soil, and plants thereof.
https://www.imagesfromtexas.com/blog/zen-pools-of-enchanted-rock-in-the-texas-hill-country/
A well developed prairie doesn’t really require much maintenance although, as I’ve said, we periodically burn ours because that’s a natural part of the life cycle for one.
Around here, at the start of a prairie restoration, some people will “weed” one by removing non-native and intrusive plants, but the periodic fire also has that effect, although in some ways more slowly.
I’ll try to get a picture of the Hoosier today since I’m off work and I’m hoping the trails aren’t too boggy.
Love the prairie pictures. My favorite specialty habitat is the one for psammon - the community of microscopic life forms living between grains of sand on shores.
What I’m learning in years of gardening trial and error is that microclimates are everywhere, and they can be really small (nanoclimates?).
I never had much luck growing basil in my (upstate NY, USDA Plant Hardiness Zone 5b) herb garden. But when I stuck a leftover basil seedling into a south-facing corner sheltered by two white-painted house walls, it went NUTS. Just that minor degree of increase in heat, light and dryness was all it needed.
Loved it. I did some more reading, and I’ll take the liberty of adding it here.
Fascinating stuff.
j
One of my friends had a comparable experience when she planted a canna bulb in a place where she had never done it before. These things that were previously as tall as she was, were growing up to the eaves.
Earlier this year, we found out that the house where my mother was raised, and hadn’t been maintained to speak of since my grandmother sold it in 1975, was demolished. My brother considered buying the lot and letting it revert to its natural state (this is in a small town) but then he found out that someone else in town bought the land, and moved a double-wide mobile home over the utility hook-ups.
Continuing the theme of niche locations for plants, I was on a cycle trail today which is built on a disused railway line. There is a stretch of old railway embankment, about 50 meters long - this is it:
- where Early Purple Orchids grow. Here’s one I photographed today:
That’s the bank where they grow. The trail/old railway line continues for miles in each direction, but they don’t grow anywhere else.
Some orchids - perhaps most of the UK native species - require the presence of a mycorrhizal fungus in order to grow, but I don’t think early purple is one of them. The bank in question is pretty sunny and south facing - but early purples like, or at least don’t mind, a bit of shade. They grow happily in a wood. Lots of orchids like chalk or limestone, but early purple isn’t particular. So it’s all a bit weird - there’s something about that little stretch that suits them down to the ground (pun unintentional) and they just won’t spread beyond it.
Aside: I wasn’t expecting to see any today, as it’s still rather early and its been cold for the last couple of weeks; but they were fully out, and there must have been at least 70 spikes, as many as I have ever seen there.
j
Prairie Update (US version)
Posting on behalf of @Broomstick
“As a general statement, one reason for the differences between my prairie and your prairie is that
mine is not mowed. So you have leftover bits from last year obscuring some of the new growth. This prairie is never mowed, as I’ve said, every few years it is burned. Otherwise, it can be quite untidy
because it’s a wild area. Nonetheless, you can see some of the green starting to come through”.
“Other areas… still a lot of overburdening debris. Not much green visible here.”
“Another view”
“This is from the parking lot over looking the “restoration area” that is being restored to prairie and intended as a buffer zone between the primordial prairie and the altered local area. There’s some non-grass vegetation that’s re-greening, as well as the grasses starting to green up.”
“Another shot from the parking area. The line of trees in the distance marks the edge of the preserve where houses and businesses take over the landscape.”
j
ETA: BTW, Google Photos crops pictures when I post them. If you wish to see the full picture, you need to click on it.
And here’s something which I hadn’t realized is a habitat very closely associated with my part of the world - chalk rivers and lakes. We were in Arundel the other day, and took a walk round Swanbourne Lake. Arundel is built across the junction of the chalk hills of the South Downs and the levels - which are alluvial plains at pretty much nothing above sea level. Swanbourne Lake lies on this perimeter, nestling in the chalk hills, is fed by chalk springs, and empties via The Mill Stream into the nearby River Arun.
I have to confess that I didn’t know much about chalk rivers (or lakes) beyond the fact that they are excellent habitats for freshwater crayfish (and presumably other shelled creatures) because of their handily high chalk content. So here’s a short article on them.
Only 200 chalk rivers are known globally, 85% of which are found in the UK in southern and eastern England.
Crikey - I never knew they were so rare, and I didn’t know I was in chalk river central. I know a bunch of them - The Meon, the Test, the Itchen, Silent Pool.
England’s chalk rivers and streams are world famous for trout and salmon fishing
Now here’s a thing, about a year ago we were walking along by the Test, and I have never seen so may fish (trout) in a river. I tried to take photos for the Today In Nature thread, but I failed (fish portrait photos are not easy)…
Anyways, to answer the hanging question of How Clear Is That Water, Then?, here’s a photo of The Mill Stream that I took on Saturday. Trimmed as ever by Google Photos, click for the full pic.
j
@Treppenwitz I still think my prairie is a couple weeks behind your prairie in growth. We’ve had chilly spring, which slows things down, and in general we have a colder and longer winter than you do. We’ll see how it goes.
We do get blooms of flowers. I’ll see if I can catch a few when they happen. And I’m also hoping to show you the results of a controlled burn.
Polders: the marais [marshes] of the Cotentan peninsula.
Or to give them their proper title, Parc naturel régional des Marais du Cotentin et du Bessin. As an aside, I see that the wiki entry for Polders lists New Orleans and Sacramento – San Joaquin River Delta as US polders, so if anyone has material to contribute re them, that would be good. The wiki entry also defines three types of polder:
As I understand it, the Cotentin marais are the second of these. The lower plains flood from winter rains, and are largely drained by May, after which the floodplains are mostly used as cattle pasture.
Le bas-pays, le long des fleuves côtiers, composé de prairies humides est inondé pendant l’hiver. C’est le marais caractéristique du parc, avec ses horizons ouverts, l’altitude est comprise entre 0 et 5 mètres. (The low country, along the coastal rivers, composed of wet meadows is flooded during the winter. It is the characteristic marsh of the park, with its open horizons, the altitude is between 0 and 5 meters. )
We parked up at Pointe de Brévands on the dike that separates the marais from the sea – a view of the pastures:
So: flat. If you really zoom in, there’s a white dot on the right hand side of that water course just as it disappears from view. That’s a great white egret. Interestingly we saw GWEs (only) on the freshwater side of the dike; and little egrets (only) on the saltwater side.
These are working cattle pastures (though no cattle yet, it seemed); but they’re still supporting a wealth of wildlife, with waterfowl and reed dwellers which we couldn’t identify.
Hopefully this link will open google maps in satellite view, showing the area we were looking down on. Note the grid of drainage ditches. ETA - you need to click on the square, bottom left of the image to open satellite view.
Inland, we visited La Maison du Parc, which is a sort of exhibition building that fronts a nature reserve, based around a large lake with half a dozen hides. An annual ticket costs you 5 Euro – well worthwhile. The headliners are the storks, nesting on platforms.
We saw three nests – there may be more. As huge nests on high poles in a dead flat environment go, they’re surprisingly difficult to spot. Chicks being fed was great to see.
The park supports sheep and cattle in the traditional manner. The central lake had waterfowl, egrets, and musk rats and coypu – the last 2 being introduced species, of course. The dikes feeding the lake additionally had very loud frogs; and we saw southern marsh orchids and lax flowered orchids growing on the pasture.
j
Note: The Maison du parc webpage and the wiki for the marais appear to be in French only. Nothing I can do about that, and I couldn’t find a good English language alternative. I hope there’s no rule against referencing non-english source material – you can page translate with a variety of apps. Mods, if this is a problem could you please delete this post and I’ll rebuild it without the refs.
Since Friday 5/20/22 we have had a bit more than 3 feet of snow where I live. Micro Environment? Not really. But sucks when you are looking for spring.
Are you in Colorado?
One of my Facebook friends, a HS classmate, lives at 9,000 feet and he got pummeled, but they expect that any time of the year.
Yeah. Colorado. I’m at 11,200 feet. It is to be expected. March, April and May are generally our heaviest snow months.
We call this mud season up here.
Prairie update (again). Photos taken today.
Atlantic Coast
South Central
Pacific Northwest
For anyone just happening across this, I should point out that these are prairies recreated some twenty-odd miles south of London, England, because if you don’t know that I’m about to say something that will make no sense. The prairies look rather different now - particularly PNW - but I had the suspicion that part of this difference is down to some invasion in the SC version. That’s clover growing in the foreground, so far as I can tell. I assume that’s a British invader - but if I’m wrong (and it’s something that grows in the original), please let me know.
Still haven’t managed to collar a local prairie gardener.
j