These highbush cranberries give some needed winter color to camp.
“Native high bush cranberry fruit…is a preferred food only of ruffed grouse and cedar waxwing, but fruit is also eaten by over 20 other species. More importantly, fruits hang on throughout the winter and serve as critical emergency food when other sources are not available. Because the tips die over the winter, plants become very bushy as they get older. They provide valuable cover and are used as nesting sites by several species of birds.”
from http://www.macphailwoods.org/shrub/hbcran.html
Moss on Trunk of TreeOriginally uploaded by Camp Naturalist.There’s always something interesting happening out in woods. Although I’d really like some snow
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Green Mushroom on Massasauga trail
Here is a sassafras twig. The band on the left is a terminal scar that indicates where the end of the branch was last year. You can measure how much growth there has been on branches from these points.
This is a hackberry tree. This is an easy bark identify by its extremely bumpy bark. Some call hackberry trees back scratcher trees.
Here is some red osier dogwoods. If you see these you know you are near wetland soil.
Here are the stocks of black raspberries. I love the chaulky white film that develops. It’s interesting to me that these plants make an arch with roots on both ends.
Moss growing on an old stump. There’s so much going on here it’s like its own planet.
Shelf Mushrooms on an a stump
