Category: Wild Flowers

It’s Here…

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Early May and the Spring bloom is in full swing here on the southern shore of Lake Michigan in the Indiana Dunes National Park. Our reasonably cold winter this year pushed back the start of spring, but things are popping up all over the place now. The Bailly Calumet trail is always a good one this time of year, particularly down along the river.

Prairie Trillium is a favorite this time of year.
Poison Ivy. It is all over this trail and despite the rash it can cause, I find it to be a rather attractive plant so I photograph it a lot.
I find the symmetry and the layers of Daisies to be fascinating when viewed from directly above.
Phlox! A real highlight of this day.
I always like taking photos of wild flowers from directly overhead. Because of their branching structure Phlox is always fun to photograph like this.
Wild Geranium. Similar to Phlox this plant has interesting growth structures that make it a very pleasing subject.
The flower of Mayapple hangs upside down and underneath the canopy of the main leaf. This makes it challenging to photograph, particularly when using a larger camera with a big lens. But I do my best.
Jack in the Pulpit. I typically only come across a few of these lovely and unusual flowers. But today I wandered into a large patch of them.
I like when I come across one of these scenes where the protective casing of the petals is just opening up to reveal the treasure inside.

A Marshy Birthday…

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One week after my first opportunity to do volunteer restoration work in the Great Marsh, another plug planting was scheduled. And as it turns out this one was the day before my Birthday! I considered it a wonderful birthday present to be able to spend another afternoon working and hiking in the marsh. I am learning a lot about what goes into this type of restoration work, and it is a lot of work.

After the plug planting was finished, I popped over to the Great Marsh trail which is very close to the area we were working in. The opportunity to work in an area of the marsh undergoing restoration work and then go and hike in an area which has been largely restored was very rewarding.

This was my second time helping with planting plugs in the marsh. I paid a bit more attention to what we were planting this time. I mostly planted Tussock Sedges and Blue Iris’s. These buckets held ~50 sedge plugs each.
This is a pretty typical patch of ground that I was planting in. The water looks kind of milky because it is reflecting the overcast sky. These “dry” areas are not dry at all. Just below the surface is several inches of watery mud. Very easy to dig out holes for the plugs. Also very easy to discover your boots are being held captive by the mud if you are not careful.
This shows the area of the marsh we were working in. Most of the team was students from a couple of nearby colleges. There were about 25 of us and we worked throughout the area circled in yellow. The tracks you see are leftover from heavy equipment the park used in the earlier stages of the restoration work. They were not really apparent at ground level.

After the restoration work I headed over the Great Marsh trail to enjoy photographing an area that is farther along in the restoration process.

Purple Dead-Nettle, of the mint family, is one of the early risers in the spring. It is pretty, but not native. I am not sure if it is considered invasive however.
I really like capturing the early growth of the grasses, when everything is still close to the ground.
Waterdrops on plants, love em.
The Mayapple is peaking through out the park. Covering big patches of the ground with their umbrella shaped leaves.
The yellow asters are just beginning to unfold.

Yeah, it was a pretty good Birthday!