Photo courtesy of Burnetta Hinterthuer

The view from Compton Gardens up into the crown of a basswood tree, Tilia americana, that ANPS members on Burnetta Hinterthuer’s field trip (May 13, 2012) estimated to be between 80 and 100 feet high.

Also witnessed were the state champion yellowwood, Cladrastis kentuckea, and the state champion “hybrid chestnut,” a cross between the endangered American chestnut, Castanea dentata, and Chinese chestnut, C. mollissima, a tree frequently grown in Arkansas for its large, delicious seeds.

Yellowwood in flower
Photo courtesy of Martha Bowden

Flowers of the beautiful yellowwood, Cladrastis kentuckea, a lover of sweet (alkaline) soils, uncommon and local in the Southeast and North America’s only species of Cladrastis. Five additional species occur in eastern Asia.

plaque at Compton Gardens

Arkansas Forestry Commission plaque declaring the Compton yellowwood the Arkansas state champion. Trunk circumference = 53 inches, crown spread = 71 feet, height = 55 feet, for a Bigness Index of 126. The species was recently rediscovered in Pulaski County on ledges above Rebsamen Park.

]]> http://anps.org/2012/05/27/a-very-highlight-from-crystal-bridgescompton-garden/feed/ 0 summitlady238 Large basswood at Compton Gardens ca Yellowwood bloom Yellowwod plaque at Compton Gardens http://anps.org/2012/05/14/highlights-from-the-spring-meeting-in-jonesboro-may-2012/ http://anps.org/2012/05/14/highlights-from-the-spring-meeting-in-jonesboro-may-2012/#comments Mon, 14 May 2012 21:56:54 +0000 Martha http://anps.org/?p=1370 Continue reading →]]>

Crowley’s Ridge Nature Center
photo by Sid Vogelpohl

Larry Lowman, guest speaker, shares his knowledge with Donna Hanke during a field trip to the Crowley’s Ridge Nature Center.  Betty Nichols, in background, maintains the Native Plant Garden as a Master Gardener.

Lindera melissifolia (pondberry)
photo by Sid Vogelpohl

Members on a Sunday field were introduced to the federally listed (Endangered) Lindera melissifolia (pondberry) by Brent Baker.  A close relative is Lindera benzoin (spicebush).

Arkansas Natural Heritage Commission botanist (and ANPS Past President) Brent Baker’s trip to ANHC’s Cove Creek Natural Area northwest of Greenbrier in Faulkner County—the first walkabout of the new season!—drew a very respectable turnout of 13 ANPS members:  Martha Bowden (Webmaster), Don Crank (Past President), Donna and Bruno Hanke, Becky Hardin and Butch Hinton, Jay Justice (longtime president of the Arkansas Mycological Society), Pat and Sandy Morris, Eric (President Elect) and Milanne Sundell, and Sid (Treasurer) and Jeanette Vogelpohl.

The grand prize of the mile and a half trail loop was to be a look—a first look for many of us—at the Ozark spring beauty growing in ledges and crevices of the sandstone bluffs high above Cove Creek. The plants are not only rare, occurring in just a few known populations in Arkansas, Missouri, and Oklahoma, but their status as a species distinct from Carolina spring beauty was only recently appreciated: Claytonia ozarkensis was described as new to science in 2006. Theo Witsell featured Ozark spring beauty in the Fall 2007 Claytonia, which you can revisit at the ANPS website to see a couple of beautiful and informative photographs of plants in flower. In that article, Theo describes the Eureka Moment when he figured out the astonishing mechanism by which the plants disperse their seeds to sites where they have the best chance to thrive free from the competition of larger species.

“The stems, which had been cascading down from the crevices in March, with the flowers facing out away from the bluffs, were now in full fruit. But the stems had turned around and were stuffing the mature seed capsules back into the bluffs! In many cases the capsules had found cracks and crevices in the bluff and were being inserted right into them.”

Ozark spring beauty (Claytonia ozarkensis)

In Jeanette Vogelpohl’s accompanying photo, this adaptation is nicely illustrated: several of the swelling seed capsules, at the tips of elongating stalks, can be seen ‘hunting’ for a dark crevice in which to open and release their contents, the seeds for the next generation of cliff-dwelling Ozark spring beauties.

Our walk at Cove Creek brought to mind a southern European plant unrelated to spring beauty that has evolved a similar dispersal mechanism for a similar habitat: Kenilworth-ivy, Cymbalaria muralis (the species epithet means “of walls” or “growing on walls”), is a beautiful, fascinating, and, yes, alien weed that occurs wild in Arkansas (to my knowledge) in only one place, Eureka Springs, where it is locally abundant and easily observed clambering over garden walls, rock piles, and even at sidewalk and parking lot borders. There the exquisitely adaptive dispersal mechanism can be examined without the fear of losing your life by toppling over a sandstone bluff. The adaptation is captured in a time-lapse motion picture segment in David Attenborough’s BBC production, “The Private Life of Plants,” Volume 1, on how plants do their traveling.

The Cove Creek loop trail harbored two additional rare plants. Draba aprica, a whitlow-grass of the mustard family, (and one of the most easily overlooked species of flowering plants in the world), is rated G3/S2 (globally vulnerable). If the lovely dandelion can be ignored and even despised because it’s so common, then perhaps ‘open-ground whitlow-grass’ can attract some appreciation for its rarity.

Brent and Eric examining the white clover, Trifolium carolinianum (Photo by Sid Vogelpohl)

The other rare plant was wild white clover, Trifolium carolinianum, a native species superficially similar to but entirely distinct from the abundant lawn and roadside alien, white clover, T. repens. The alien is a stoloniferous perennial, rooting at the nodes; the native is variously described both as annual and perennial, but either way non-stoloniferous. Theo featured wild white or Carolina clover in his article on Arkansas’ native clovers back in the Fall 2009 Claytonia. He observes that the species, which at that time he had seen in the wild only once, in the past had been common: “Nearly all of the known collections are historical, with most made between the 1880s and 1940s, and very few made since the 1950s.” The widespread decline of the native clover, which occurs throughout the Southeast, is a mystery, especially as it thrives on disturbance. Brent Baker pointed out a small population under our feet in the middle of the walking trail and another at the edge of the parking area. We were too early for flowers, but we put our trust in Brent’s keen field eye and added Trifolium carolinianum to our life lists.

Arkansas’ premier mycologist, Jay Justice, noticed the black cup fungus Urnula along the path. My former dendrology students used to call them black roses. Our timing was perfect. Several of us knew how to tickle the cups with a finger to unleash the cloud of spores, but Jay taught us the alternative technique of simply blowing softly across the top of the cups. After the split second delay, a puff of smoke rose into the air. Very cool!

We saw some wildlife: a box turtle & a cottonmouth. But we were out for flowers. And if you’re out for flowers in Arkansas in late March and early April, it’s hard not to have a rewarding walk. We were met by the usual delightful surprises of spring, for example, red buckeye, flowering dogwood, fringe-tree, cross-vine, wild hyacinth, Ohio spiderwort, and fire-pink. For especially photogenic blue, there was blue-eyed-Mary, and bird’s foot violet blooming near the cedars in patches of reindeer moss. Blueberries were everywhere: Vaccinium virgatum (we’re pretty sure it wasn’t V. pallidum) was common, with closed, urn-shaped corollas, and V. stamineum, deerberry, with open, campanulate corollas, was uncommon. Both promised that the future would be sweet. But yellow may have been the dominant theme of the day. Two species of golden ragwort appeared and reappeared, Senecio tomentosus and S. plattensis, both classified now in the genus Packera, but still pretty. Three buttercups with large, medium, and small flowers (also called grande, venti, and tall in the technical literature) accompanied us most of the way: Ranunculus fascicularis, R. harveyi, and R. abortivus. And yellow star-grass was beaming. What a fine trip!

For more information on Cove Creek Natural Area and other natural areas in Arkansas, visit the  Arkansas Natural Heritage Commission website.

Our Join page has information on how you can become a member of the Arkansas Native Plant Society.

Field trips of the Arkansas Native Plant Society are for members. Botanists from around the state lead these educational walks. While on the trails, participants may ask questions, take photographs, and learn about the ecology of the area.

Membership information is available here.

May 4-6, 2012

Crowley’s Ridge – Jonesboro, Arkansas

FRIDAY EVENING, May 4, Arkansas State University Student Union, Spring River Room (Parking in North Parking Deck most convenient)

Registration 4-7 p.m.  Members are reminded that the standard $5.00 registration fee will be charged.

Sign up for Saturday and Sunday walks 4-7 p.m.

Spring Meeting Information update 4/30:  

Iced tea and cookies will be provided by ASU’s Food Services. However, ANPSers are welcome to bring snacks and munchies to supplement. Plant lovers cannot live on tea and cookies alone.

ANPS T-shirts will be available for sale, including two new designs.

Program, 7 p.m.: Presentation by Larry Lowman, “Flora and Geologic Origin of Crowley’s Ridge”

SATURDAY and SUNDAY FIELD TRIPS, May 5 & 6

Morning and afternoon field trips will take place at Crowley’s Ridge State Park and at one or two additional destinations. Locations, directions, times, and field trip leaders will be announced Friday evening. You can also contact Eric Sundell (870-723-1089) for field trip information.

SATURDAY EVENING, May 5, Arkansas State University Student Union, Spring River Room (Parking in North Parking Deck most convenient)

Registration 4-7 p.m.

Sign up for Sunday walk 4-7 p.m.

Spring Meeting Information update 4/30:  

Iced tea and cookies will be provided by ASU’s Food Services. However, ANPSers are welcome to bring snacks and munchies to supplement. Plant lovers cannot live on tea and cookies alone.

ANPS T-shirts will be available for sale, including two new designs. 

Program, 7:00 p.m.: Presentation by Travis Marsico, “Plant Defenses against Insect Herbivores”

Business Meeting to follow presentation

 LODGING for Spring Meeting

ANPS has reserved a block of 30 rooms at a reduced rate at Comfort Suites in Jonesboro. Room charges, including hot breakfast, will be $75 + tax for a King or $80 + tax for two Queens. (Don’t worry—all ANPS members, whether nobility, gentry, or yeomanry, get the same rates.) The motel is located near the junction of US Highways 63 & 49, just south of the ASU campus. Thirty rooms are guaranteed to ANPS at reduced rate through April 23, 2012, however, if rooms are available after that date, we will still be extended the reduced rate.

Comfort Suites
3404 Access Road
Jonesboro, AR 72401
870-336-2280

Membership information is available here.

Participants should gather at the Mt. Magazine state park Visitors’ Center at 10 a.m. for a two hour morning walk. Bring a sack lunch or dine at the lodge.

After lunch, Eric and Sid will lead a second trip to the intriguing, Arkansas-endemic Maple-Leaf Oaks near Brown Springs.

Folks leaving the mountain via Paris are welcome to make a stop at the Vogelpohls’ place and score yet a third field trip, thus completing a rare one-day botanical hat trick.

Field trips of the Arkansas Native Plant Society are for members. Botanists from around the state lead these educational walks. While on the trails, participants may ask questions, take photographs, and learn about the ecology of the area.

Membership information is available here.

Whereas previous hikes at the Vogelpohl’s have largely stayed off steeper slopes, this hike will follow trails along steep slopes (short segments suitable for mountain goats) so should be considered strenuous.  (Those who do not care for a strenuous hike may stay near the house.) Bring a picnic lunch to carry with you.  Please contact the Vogelpohl’s the week before to allow for a “head-count” and for directions.  House location:  2480 South Hwy 309; turn east one mile south of Paris Square and follow Hwy 309 for two miles to address.  Time:  9:45 AM with no set end time.  Home phone:  479-963-1528.  svog1@centurytel.net

Field trips of the Arkansas Native Plant Society are for members. Botanists from around the state lead these educational walks. While on the trails, participants may ask questions, take photographs, and learn about the ecology of the area.

Membership information is available here.

Time:  1 pm

Directions:  Exit 126 off I-40, North on 65 to Greenbrier. At the 3rd light in Greenbrier (American Drug on the R), turn Right onto 225.  Go 8.6 miles to Happy Valley Road and take a Right.  Go 2.2 miles on Happy Valley Road (always staying left).  At this point there is a dirt road straight ahead with a street marker for Beasley Road.  Go down Beasley road, thru the gate and take a Right immediately.  Can’t miss us!

Field trips of the Arkansas Native Plant Society are for members. Botanists from around the state lead these educational walks. While on the trails, participants may ask questions, take photographs, and learn about the ecology of the area.

Membership information is available here.

The symposium is planned for natural resources professionals and scientists in the southern United States (Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas) who are involved in the ecology, management, and restoration of prairie habitats.

Invited speakers will address prairie remnants, conservation, and working grasslands. Scientists and resource professionals will deliver submitted papers on advances in prairie restoration and enhancement. The symposium will conclude with a panel discussion on needs and approaches to guide future prairie restoration and enhancement efforts.

An edited volume based on symposium presentations will be produced. Additionally, a technical manual focusing on effective regional prairie restoration techniques, lessons learned, and future needs may be produced.

More information about the symposium is available here.

After a tour of the Riddle Cabin, a century-old log cabin relocated to the site and which was the birth home of folklorist Almeda Riddle, you will be able stroll along a trail system through many of the different habitats on the property. The trails wind through glades and spring runs; atop sandstone bluffs; through oak-hickory, pine-hardwood forest, and pine forest; near an upland depression wetland; and to a bedrock-bottom stream that flows into the lake via a seasonal waterfall. Several portions of the trail system offer wonderful views of the lake.

Directions:  From the junction of U.S. Highway 65 and AR State Highways 9 and 330 in Choctaw, south of Clinton, travel approximately 3.7 miles east on AR State Highway 330 toward Greers Ferry Lake to Klondike Road.  Turn left (north) on Klondike Road and travel approximately 1 mile to a point where Klondike Road turns sharply to the right (east). Instead of following to the right, continue straight north (this is Bachelor Road, but sign may not be present) and travel one-half mile down into a stream valley, over a small bridge, and then up to the top of the hill to the black iron gate on the right. Turn right and travel approximately one-quarter mile through the gate, past two homes on the left, to the first dirt road on the left. Take the left turn and travel about 0.15 mile to the log cabin.

For a map or more information about South Fork Nature Center, visit www.southforknaturecenter.org.  On the website, you can also check out a list (by clicking on the “Reports” tab) of the plants documented from South Fork property, as well as descriptions of the habitats present on the site.

Join Baker for the morning only or bring a lunch and continue the walk during the afternoon. For more information, contact him at 479.970.9143 or brent@arkansasheritage.org.

Field trips of the Arkansas Native Plant Society are for members. Botanists from around the state lead these educational walks. While on the trails, participants may ask questions, take photographs, and learn about the ecology of the area.

Membership information is available here.