We spent Sunday in Stokes State Forest surveying three more small trails for the
NY-NJ Trail Conference's Invasives Strike Force. It was a nice surprise to see how little those trails were invaded, although we did see our first clump of purple loosestrife (trust me, it's evil). The forest always has little gifts to give you each visit, so we took pictures of the ones we could catch. I didn't dare go for the camera when a little ovenbird crossed the trail just a few feet in front of me for fear of scaring it, but that was my enduring image for the day.
While walking around Stony Lake Trail, we noticed two stressed trees - as evidenced by their too-early fall foliage - by the lakeside. A closer look revealed the source of the stress - beaver chew!
While surveying for invasives, one spends a lot of time looking at ground level. I happened to glance upwards when we stopped to mark a GPS point and was rewarded by a very well constructed wasp's nest. I could tell that I was on Hunger Games overload when the first thing that came to mind was "
tracker jackers!"
These orange flowers were everywhere, and we didn't know what they were. After some time with
Newcomb's Wildflower Guide, we determined it to be spotted touch-me-not (or jewelweed). It makes sense, since jewelweed is supposed to be an antidote to poison ivy, and I remember hearing on
Dual Survival that they often grow near one another. Please note that Japanese stiltgrass is SO invasive that it even photobombed this picture; it's the leaf with the silver stripe down the middle to the left of the flower.
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