Blazing and Botany

  Went back out to the trail today and only got another half-mile, in only one direction, blazed. Seems slow. Oh well, it takes however long it takes to do it right. Here's a new blaze, and I was going to show you that you can just see the next one from this point. But the picture is too small!

You'll have to trust me that you can see it when you are out there. I marked it for you. When I zoomed the picture enough, I could see it.

I took quite a few pictures of plants, but a lot of them are not in focus. I'll have to try again. I got a few. This is downy yellow violet, Viola pubescens. It has tiny soft hairs and stipules, neither of which you can see in this picture.

And growing with it was long-spurred violet, Viola rostrata. This one is fun, because I don't see it too often. Will try to get better pictures of the key features. But one is that none of the petals have a "beard." I blew the picture way up, and all these petals are smooth.

There are lots of bedstraws. They are pretty easy to identify as a group because they have whorls of leaves growing around a long stalk. This one is fragrant bedstraw, Galium triflorum. Generally this one has 6 leaves in a whorl, but the key thing is that they creep along the ground and they are soft to the touch. Several others are rough. I saw another interesting one, but didn't take its picture. Tried to spot it walking back but didn't see it. Hopefully, I'll find it another day.

In other news: I edited in the morning, and I hope to work on the Newaygo County Data Book some more this evening.

North Country Trail, Lake County, MI, 5 Mile road out and back doing trail work- 3 miles total

North Country Trail miles so far in 2021 is at 266.

See Yesterday and Today