Mood:
lyricalNow Playing: Amy Winehouse
Topic: The weekly flower report!
Hi! Yesterday was Mother's day so we made the circuit of both mothers. My mom got a nice glass candle candle holder set, (she's really into candles and things) and Dave's mom got some plants. I needed to divide a couple day lilies so she got a bunch of heritage lilies and a couple hybrids. i also planted the last of my pansies at her place.
Dave and I went for a nice walk through the forest at that park of Union street withe the name I can't spell. There are several glacial age eskers and the typical flora found in these formations. At one time the entire waterloo region would have been either forested eskers and sandy meadows. It's trillium time and there were clusters of small white one, small pink ones, a few scattered red and some of the giant white trilliums. We also saw several species of Jack in the pulpits, including a few of the red and green striped miniatures and one red giant. There were may apples, but not yet in flower. areas were carpeted in bloodroot, which makes a lovely red dye, and the red juice is an effective mosquito repellent. There were jewel weed seedlings everywhere. One of the eskers was rimmed with wild ginger. Wild ginger is only very distantly related to the cooking spice, ginger. The wild version smells and tastes like spicy ginger and makes a nice old fashioned candy. The rhizomes, which are just under the surface of the dirt, are scrubbed clean, cut into small pieces, and boiled in brown sugar syrup. When they are cool and dry they are quite tasty. the cat-briers were just unfurling. The only fungus we found were artist's fungus and various brackets/hoof fungi. Oh yes, and puffballs, plenty of old dried up puffballs.
There are public notices that Periwinkles are now considered an invasive and dangerous plant that threatens the forest. For a while it seemed like that one patch of periwinkle would spread through the whole forest. They've also declared the Garlic Mustard and dangerous invader, and it's easy to see why. large portions of the waterloo side of the forest are now blanketed in garlic mustard...no more trilliums, no Jack in the Pulpit, no under-story to the forest except garlic mustard. One hiker through before us was a mustard murderer because there were yanked out plants strewn across the path. It smelled nice, sort of onion and garlic. Too bad the plant doesn't taste anything like it smells. They are working hard to eradicate both of theses obnoxious pest plants.
Next week Dave wants to go to the Cressman's wood's area. The official name is "Homer Watson Park" after the artist who painted pictures of it. It's changed so much from when I was a kid, large areas are now fenced off, the spring is capped (That's to one with the old legends surrounding it) and the old rail line in gone. There are still some unique eskers and glacial formations covered in unique flora, so it's almost worth a visit. Not far from that forest is the true gem of the city, Hidden Valley. It's drumlins, eskers, and carolinian meadows, all in one small area. There's a large wetland with deer, muskrats, beavers...the fungal flora is the most diverse in the region, with a dizzying number of Amanitas including Caesar's amanita, panthers, fly agarics, grissettes and many, many lookalikes. We found a couple green Death Caps once, They are tall, elegant...almost picture perfect, and completely deadly. There were no white destroying angels. We once found some Morels, and then never again. There is no finer fungal food than a meal of Morels.
That's all for today. I have things I need to do, and they aren't getting done with me just siting here!
