Before getting to our lovely two reports and Season Watch synopsis, John and Heidi start things off with a case of mistaken identity and a brief chat about duck butts!
I'm a sucker for co-host banter, so I hope you enjoy it, too (and, of course, learn something new).
Please note as schools let out for the summer, we become more and more hungry for reports for our Phenology Talkbacks segment. Please don’t hesitate to reach out with your observations, nature tales and insights! Get in touch with me (smitchell@kaxe.org), John Latimer (jlatimer@kaxe.org), or text "phenology" to 218-326-1234.
Long Lake Conservation Center
Dakota and Brian reported from Migizi’s trip to Long Lake Conservation Center:
“Swimming in the lake was our favorite activity and we did that every chance we got, even between the summer rainstorms!
“Our trip into the bog was a highlight. Some of us really got into it, going about 3 feet down into the moss. The blueberries near the bog are just starting to ripen, the bog rosemary is in bloom and the tawny cotton grass flowers are blooming all across the bog as far as the eye can see.
“We had some interesting sightings, including hearing an owl hooting at dusk, and a young spike buck. The turkey poults are growing fast, loons were heard calling at night, and during the day, four loons were seen having what looked like a pretty good time swimming/bathing in the lake together.
“A Common Merganser with six chicks was spotted near the beach. We hadn’t seen any mergansers since early spring, so this sighting was a bit of a surprise. What wasn’t a surprise was how delicious the wild raspberries tasted.
“It was a great week in nature and we want to remind everyone to … Unplug, get outside, and LIVE CONNECTED!”
John, being a kid at heart, would have been right there with them in the bog, out swimming and wolfing down raspberries. Long Lake is a great place for all three activities — we're glad that these students had a blast!
Roots and Wings Forest School
“This is Jenny and Madison reporting from Empowering Kids at Roots and Wings Forest School in New York Mills.
“We saw lots of bugs and there are more wasps and flies. There are many monarch butterflies and we have four chrysalises. We saw evidence of an aspen leaf miner on a leaf.
“There are many flowers in bloom including goldenrod, hyssop, chicory and yarrow. There is also lots of poison ivy.
“Thanks for listening! Stay wild!”
John appreciated the note on poison ivy, although he doesn’t appreciate the rash the plant gives him. Some people (lucky ducks) are immune to poison ivy’s irritating oils. John and I are not among them.
"I’m in the group of those who are afflicted by it, and so far — knock on my head, because it’s mostly wood — I haven’t had poison ivy this year,” John joked.
Season Watch Facebook feature
This week on our Season Watch Facebook page (which Heidi refers to as “the best use of social media”) we saw a lot of butterflies (including viceroys, American ladies, a mourning cloak, and two species of fritillaries), a loon with a white patch on its forehead, and a few photos of the ghost plant emerging.
John came prepared this week with an article he wrote for The Senior Reporter on ghost plants. These fascinating white plants don’t produce any chlorophyll, relying entirely on underground fungal networks to provide their food and nutrients.
“The complexity of the plant is sort of visual evidence to something we don’t ever even realize, and that is what is going on under our feet,” John elaborates. “We tend to see the forest as a collection of discrete trees and shrubs, each one individual and self-contained. That is not the case.”
Trees, shrubs, mushrooms and the ghost pipe are all interconnected by an underground network of plant roots and fungal hyphae (interconnected hyphae form a mycelium, which is sometimes visible as a white rootlike “mat” growing in decaying material). These systems are interconnected, with the trees providing energy and the fungi providing essential nutrients.
The fungal hyphae are incredibly small and able to reach pockets of nutrients plant roots cannot. Despite the small size of each individual hypha, the larger mycelial lattice is incredibly dense. A single teaspoon of soil holds almost 220 yards of hyphae!
This large fungal network interconnects with plant roots throughout the forest, creating a “world wood web” where nutrients, energy and information is exchanged between individuals. The ghost plant is a spectacular, visible reminder of this incredible underground system.
That does it for this week! For more phenology, subscribe to our Season Watch Newsletter or visit the Season Watch Facebook page.
Funding for this project was provided by the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund as recommended by the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR).
