Nature Walk 5/5/12

This morning a light drizzle was falling so we saw lots of cool plants but few birds of interest.  Garlic mustard everywhere, so if you see some, pull it up!  It is an invasive plant and chokes native plants out of our ecosystem.




A couple of late toad trillium flowers were blooming along with some Jack in the Pulpits.  3 trillium leaves are arranged equidistant around the stem, whereas 3 Jack in the pulpit leaves form a triangle to one side of the stem. 

Tilt your head to the right, now repeat after me, sedges have edges!

Barb Smith was thrilled to find at least 5 different kinds of sedges blooming.  A sedge is a grass and if you feel the stem it has edges, hence the saying "sedges have edges." 

Carpentersville Carpenter ants busy at work in a dead tree stump.  A crane fly landed on my leg but I could not photograph it.  It had 6 very long legs, just like a crane (bird.)

Newly grown hickory seedling looks like a flower blossoming.  Next Library Springs Nature Walk will be June 16th at 9:00am, rain or shine.  Come learn and see the beauty in your own backyard!

Nature Walk 1/28/12

With temperature in the low 20's and a cold wind, we cut our nature hike short, but I did get some good photos of the previous night's snowfall.  Next Library Springs hike is the Bird Walk with Dave Poweleit for the Great Backyard Bird Count on Sat. Feb. 18.

Each weed had a cap of sticky snow -it was a highly crystalized snow.

Library Springs Nature Walk 10/29/11

The poke berry stems are brilliant magenta pink right now.

 The milkweed plant fluff is everywhere.

  One huge 12 inch shell fungus on a tree that actually looked like a plastic step attached to the tree trunk.

 Beautiful groves of yellow sugar maples.  One tree trunk totally decorated with white fungus.
  The sensitive ferns have turned yellow and brown.  No birds to report, except one fox sparrow who stopped long enough for me to identify him.  Next Library Springs Nature Walk is Sat. Dec. 3, 2012 at 9:00am.  See you then!

Nature Walk Sightings 9/10/11

Beautiful sunny morning in Library Springs.  Many prairie plants over our heads including milkweed and Indian grass.  Fields full of goldenrod.  There were stands of bottle brush plant, and a few patches of poison ivy to teach the old adage, "leaves of three, let them be."  Black walnuts on many of the trees that have not fallen to the ground yet.  Thanks to the Stillman Nature Center newsletter, I know that black walnut trees attract luna moths, those large, eerie, light green moths.  Now we need to do a dusk nature hike...
  


 

Milkweed pods on 6 foot milkweed plants





Sumac leaves are just starting to turn red






 Barb Wilson, a botanist, taught us about wing flowers.  
There is an extra ridge of plant on the stems of wing flowers, like a wing on an bird.


Black Walnut tree with walnuts




Wing Flowers

 Thanks to all the rain we had this summer, everything is healthy, producing flowers, seed pods, nuts, etc. so it should be a good winter for wildlife.  The next Library Springs Nature Hike will be Sat. Oct. 29 at 9:00am.  See you then! 

Library Springs Nature Walk August 13, 2011

Five of us braved the ferocious mosquitoes to see what is new in Library Springs.  Lots of tree limb storm damage, but we saw a yellow swallowtail butterfly, a monarch butterfly, lots of thistle plants, goldfinches, robins, an indigo bunting, and fungus.  We heard blue jays and cardinals.  A deer stood motionless-still deep in the grass as we passed by.  The plants in the meadow were over our heads!  The next Library Springs nature walks are Saturday Sept. 10, Oct. 29, and Dec. 3, 2011.  Every walk is a new experience!


Fearless mosquito magnets



Motionless deer in meadow

Library Springs Nature Walk 6/18/11



Coreopsis

 Five families joined me for today's walk!  We saw and learned about monarch butterfly eggs on milkweed leaves, wild strawberries, poison ivy, ferns, and many other plants.  We heard and learned about the birdcalls of indigo buntings, red bellied woodpeckers, house wrens, and red winged blackbirds.  The worst part was the hungry mosquitoes, the best part was it did not rain!

Group photo

Orange fungus in the summer

Nature Walk Library Springs 5/21/11

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Jack-in-the Pulpit

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Ferns in Library Springs

Humid, mild morning with sprinkles of rain.  Heard and observed 3 indigo buntings, calls of red bellied woodpeckers, robins, song sparrows, and flocks of blue jays.  The ferns are up, including my favorite sensitive fern, and the largest jack-in-the pulpit plants I have ever seen- it's like they are on steroids or something.  Thanks to all the hard working Dundee Township local volunteers who "clean-up" Library Springs by planting, burning, weeding and  propagating the wonderful plants and trees that attract such a rich abundance of wildlife.  We really appreciate it!








Sensitive Fern with scalloped edges