The Bailly Calumet trail is one of my favorites, and it turned out to be my chosen trail for my hike on the first day of winter. Though it still feels like fall with no snow or particularly cold temperatures. Even so, there are few people on the trails this time of year. Though it is way past time for blooming wildflowers and fungi, it is still well worth coming out to experience.
All of the trail heads have these nice informational displays along with trail maps you can take with you.
Most of the mushrooms that are hardy enough to persist into winter are looking pretty bland by now. Gone are the bright, vivid colors. So I was pleasantly surprised to see these two spots of purple when I flipped a piece of wood over. The bottom had been sitting in the moist soil.
Along one particular stretch of the trail many of the trees are heavily wrapped in vines of different types.
Often times where you see large pieces of bark cleanly stripped away from a tree you will fine the tunnels of borrowing larva.
The park service conducts controlled burns as part of their efforts to restore and maintain the ecosystem. The fire produces beautiful patterns in cracked and blackened pieces of wood throughout the trails.
The symmetry of the split in the bark and the blue hues in the underling wood caught my eye.