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Progress of Spring - May 16

on May 17, 2020

Witchwood Biodiversity Update 2022

2021 and 2022 were relatively quiet years in terms of surveying at the Witchwood. I spent sadly little time there - surveying or otherwise, and I felt the loss deeply. But I did make several new plant and animal species discoveries I'd like to share, in addition to a number of changes and corrections to the Witchwood Biodiversity Report 2020 . I'm posting a summary here and a link to the full document here (5 pages of content). Witchwood Biodiversity Update 2022 - Summary This report further documents the biodiversity of the Witchwood, six beautiful acres of forest in Windsor, New Hampshire, USA with a four-seasons brook, forest seeps, vernal pools, and a wonderful diversity of plants, animals, fungi, and more. This is a short update/addendum to the much more extensive Witchwood Biodiversity Report 2020 , published Feb 9, 2021. This update focuses on changes to known plant taxa (Plantae), while the 2020 report is much broader in scope. Overall, a total of 203 plant taxa have

Plant Progression: Bunchberry

Bunchberry (Chamaepericlymenum canadense) was just starting to emerge this past weekend. I found three plants in various stages: See the buds starting to appear in the center? I'll add more photos as it flowers. June 1 edit: they're blooming! July 27 edit: they're in fruit. Supposedly they're edible, though I've never tried them. Some bunchberry leaves persist through the winter, so this was actually one of the plants I was able to identify before the snow fully melted. Here's how it looked then:

Seep Into Spring - April 28

The time has come to watch the seeps 1 And see what they will show. You'll only spot a green like this When Spring first starts to glow. You'll miss the golden-saxifrage 2 Unless you check the mud For mats of tiny leafy plants With 8 pricks, red as blood 3 Notes: 1 A seep is a small wetland where groundwater naturally comes to the surface. Seeps are often the first areas of forests to green in the spring. Read more . 2 American golden-saxifrage ( Chrysosplenium americanum ) is a flowering plant found only in wetlands. It is easily overlooked due to its small size and lack of showy flowers. 3 The 8 red spots are anthers - the pollen-bearing structure of the flower. Golden-saxifrage does not have petals, only 4 green sepals that unfold rather like box flaps to reveal the reproductive parts. You can see them folded closed on unopened buds if you look closely at the 3rd photo. Happy Spring!

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