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Towns Co. - Mountain Seeps Early Summer 2021 |
All Text & Images: Copyright (2021) |
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Towns Co. - Mountain Seeps Early Summer 2021 |
All Text & Images: Copyright (2021) |
| 1 - Early July, 2021: I made a visit to see how the Calopogons were doing, and to look for an uncommon plant that we first saw here in 2020. |
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| Virginia Bunchflower (Melanthium virginicum) Last year, we found one of these plants blooming in the sunny ROW. This year, there were dozens of plants blooming in the seepy areas of the shady woods. |
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| Virginia Bunchflower, in habitat. In my experience, this species is extremely uncommon in north Georgia. |
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| Virginia Bunchflower (Melanthium virginicum), close-up of inflorescence |
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| Sensitive Briar (Mimosa nuttallii) |
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| Culver's Root (Veronicastrum virginicum), still in bud. Another species that is uncommon around here... |
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| Rosinweed (Silphium sp.) |
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| Wild Carrot (Daucus carota) |
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| Shrubby St. John's Wort (Hypericum prolificum) |
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| Pale Spiked Lobelia (Lobelia spicata) |
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| Grass Pink Orchids (Calopogon tuberosus) were still blooming. |
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| Grass Pink Orchids (Calopogon tuberosus) |
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| Juvenile Widow Skimmer (Libellula luctuosa) Heavily cropped; this dragonfly was very skittish of my every approach, and I didn't have a long lens... |
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| 2 - A few days later: I gave my friends James VH and Tom D an introductory tour of the Seeps... |
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| This keys to Appalachian Barren Strawberry (Waldsteinia fragarioides) except that it is stoloniferous. Only W. lobata is stoloniferous, so it may be undescribed... |
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| Possibly Ozark Tassel Rue (Trauttvettaria applanata) See discussion in Weakley's Flora 2020 vs. Trauttvettaria caroliniensis. |
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| Ozark Tassel Rue (Trauttvettaria applanata) either that or the former taxon as T. caroliniensis... |
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| We found dozens more Virginia Bunchflower (Melanthium virginicum) in bloom. |
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| Wild Bergamot (Monarda fistulosa) |
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| Passionflower, aka Maypop (Passiflora incarnata) A common enough summer flower, but I can't help but stop and take a pic whenever I see a nice one. |
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| 3 - Mid July, 2021: We held a GPCA site management/planning meeting at the Seeps. We assessed the effectiveness of previous woody stem reduction treatments in the main site to determine additional work to be done there in the future. I only took a few photographs since I have been regularly monitoring the site... |
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| The Culver's Root buds were starting to flower... Note the Hover Fly coming in for a landing near the base... |
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| There were so many of the rare Virginaia Bunchflowers blooming that I had to include a few more pics... |
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| Virginia Bunchflower - flower detail |
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| Eastern Fairybells (Stenanthium gramineum var. robustum) in bud At first glance I thought that these were more Bunchflowers, only still in bud. A closer look revealed them to be the robustum variation of Eastern Fairybells. |
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| Pale Indian Plantain (Arnoglossum atriplicifolium) |
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| Pale Indian Plantain - stalk and leaves |
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| Kidney-leaf Rosinweed (Silphium compositum) |
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| One of the Sunflowers (Helianthus sp.) |
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| 4 - Late July, 2021: The Yellow Passion Flowers were blooming... |
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| Yellow Passion Flower (Passiflora lutea) |
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| Yellow Passion Flower (Passiflora lutea) |