10 September 2022

Hays Woods showed off its flowers and insects during our visit to Nick Liadis’ birding banding project on Wednesday.

Biennial gaura (Gaura biennis) and honeysuckle vine were both blooming in pink. Interestingly, gaura flowers bloom white and fade to pink, while this non-native honeysuckle starts pink and fades to white and then yellow.

Don’t be fooled by the camera’s perspective. Gaura flowers are very small compared to honeysuckle.

A Virginian tiger moth (Spilosoma virginica or yellow woolly bear) hung out on mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris), a very common and invasive plant at Hays Woods.

Another invasive, Japanese knotweed (Reynoutria japonica), blooms profusely at Hays Woods. Many insect pollinators love the flowers.

(photos by Kate St. John)

3 September 2022

Late August colors came in orange, yellow, purple, gray and green in Frick Park and Moraine State Park.

Above, squash(*) blooms on a fence in Frick.

Yellow daisies without petals are actually tansy (Tanacetum vulgare), native to Eurasia.

The deep purple of New York ironweed (Vernonia noveboracensis) is never true to color in my cellphone photos. Instead it looks redder than expected because the Pixel 5 Photo app apparently overcompensates for the camera’s blue bias. All cameras have problems with purple, described in this vintage article: Not Truly Blue.

This velvety bright orange mushroom in Frick deserved a photo on 25 August. Jim Chapman re-found it the next day and identified it as northern cinnabar polypore (Trametes cinnabarina, a.k.a. Pycnoporus cinnabarinus). By then it was already darker orange than this.

Insects specialize on their own host plants. False sunflowers have red aphids. Wingstem (Verbesina alternifolia) has gray ones.

And everywhere in late August there is green.

(*) Did you know that zucchini, pumpkin, summer squash and pattypan squash are all cultivars of Curcubita pepo? The plant pictured at top seems to be producing pattypan squash.

(photos by Kate St. John)

2 July 2022

Seen this week at Duck Hollow, listed in photo order:

• Catnip (Nepeta cataria) is in bloom (at top). No cats were present but plenty of dogs walked by. The Duck Hollow trail is popular with dog-walking services.
• Common mullein (Verbascum thapsus) is 5-6 feet tall now with a spike of yellow flowers.
• Moth mullein (Verbascum blattaria) is a much more delicate plant than common mullein.
• Daisy fleabane (Erigeron annuus) cast petal-shadows on its disks as it opened in the morning sun.
• Leaf miners are active now, making squiggles inside the leaves. (I don’t know the identity of the leaves pictured below.)
• Teasel (Dipsacus sp.) hasn’t bloomed yet but it is getting close.

I heard ravens calling in the distance while I took these pictures. Woo hoo!

(photos by Kate St. John)

25 June 2022

This week was pleasant, then hot, and always buggy in the woods. A few flowers were blooming and berries are ripening.

• Honewort’s (Cryptotaenia canadensis) tiny flowers are blooming in both Washington and Indiana Counties. The plant at top was along the Conemaugh Trail, site of the lone and rare Swainson’s warbler which was heard but not seen. More mosquitoes than flowers.
• Forget-me-not (Myosotis sp.)
• A rock made of sand and swamp lines. Since this is a landscaping rock I doubt it originated in Schenley Park where I found it.
• Indian hemp / dogbane (Apocynum cannabinum) is blooming in Frick Park.
• White mulberries (Morus alba) are ripe and ready to eat.

Click on the image below to see a photo of the entire rock.

Click on the fruit photo below to see the branch where this mulberry came from in Frick Park.

(photos by Kate St. John)