It's spring wildflower time!

The last few weeks have been increasingly busy, so I am behind in my blog production. 

I know there are at least some who get this blog, who aren't able to get out and enjoy the spring wildflowers like they used to. So I try and do at least one post to feature many of the spring wildflowers. 

This first one is what I thought was suitable considering the cold winter we just came through. It is one I took at Fish Point Prov Nature Reserve a few years ago, but with the verse I came across recently, it just seemed to fit.

The forest floor is covered with Dutchman's Breeches, a close-up of which is shown next.

So many flowers are becoming quite visible, at least for a short time until the canopy of the forest fills out and the forest floor becomes heavily shaded and harder for the wildflowers to peak.

Bloodroot is one of the earlier ones, and it is always a treat to see a profusion of them. 

Flowers are also occurring on trees and shrubs, such as the Choke Cherry, shown next.

Common Blue Violet

Cut-leaved Toothwort

If you look high enough, you may see flowers of a type on trees. This first one features the female catkins of an Eastern Cottonwood....

....and these are the male catkins of the same species.

Round-lobed Hepatica

Jack-in-the-pulpit

Large-flowered Bellwort

Long-spurred Violet

There is a nice woodlot not far from where I grew up and I have always been fascinated with the extensive array of Marsh Marigolds that are very abundant in the wetter sections.

Prairie Buttercup

Next is one that always attracts attention. It is Red Columbine. On rare occasion, one may even find a white version of this!

Red Trillium

Smooth Yellow Violet

Another shrub in flower right now is Spicebush, very abundant at Rondeau.

Spring Beauty

Some of the White Trilliums are still in the tight bud condition....

...but there is an increasing abundance of them in their fullness.

Yellow Trout Lily is always attractive....

...especially when they are fully open on a bright sunny day and you get a closer look.

The deer exclosures at Rondeau are always a treat to visit. Inside, the greenery is abundant, as they have not been browsed by deer at all since 1978 when they were constructed. However the flora inside is still recovering from decades of heavy browsing. This next particular photo actually does not show the abundance of Bloodroot, which was past its best when I took this. But the Large-flowered Bellwort is the current dominant.

I turned around 180 degrees and got this photo immediately adjacent to the exclosure. The wildflowers are there, but really small and scattered by comparison, as they are still being browsed by enough deer in spite of the annual deer culls over the last few years. So without regular control of the deer, the spring wildflower display just won't be what it should/could be. The fairly extensive greenery at the back is actually Japanese Barberry, a very aggressive non-native species.

However in some parts of the park, Mayapple is growing well and becoming its usual fairly dominant self.

 Here are a few other wildflowers, some native. One that is not all that common across the woodland landscape is Virginia Bluebells. I have seen it in several places, but it doesn't occur in Chatham-Kent. However in visiting a woodland where it is quite abundant, the landowner gave me several plants, which I planted in our partially forested yard, and I enjoy watching them flourish.

Another native species, but does not occur in C-K but in some sandy woodland conditions farther east is this next one: Moss Phlox. It is a very low growing plant, only a few centimetres tall.

I will finish this post with a favourite spring flower that occurs in prairie, but not in Ontario, at least not naturally. It is in the prairie patch in my yard, and is always a highlight to see! There is a pink variety as well.

Eastern Shooting-star

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May is getting off to a good start

It was a cloudy, cool day, with a brief shower before daybreak. The brisk SW winds gave some promise of new bird arrivals this side of the lake, so I went to Rondeau shortly after daybreak. The South Point Trail was a little too breezy to find much, but I did manage to see Black-throated Green Warbler and Common Yellowthroat, as well as Blue-headed Vireo, a second year Glaucous Gull, a young Bald Eagle and 2-3 Sandhill Cranes.


At the Visitor Centre, the usual mix of birds was around, plus a single male Rose-breasted Grosbeak, my first-of-year.

Tuliptree Trail was decidedly quiet, and Spicebush Trail not much less so, although on the latter there were a few Yellow-rumped Warblers. The Louisiana Waterthrush which had been seen and heard the day before was either quiet or gone today. Nothing new on the wildflower front on this trail either, although most flowers were out more noticeably. A Red Trillium was just about ready to open.....a bit more sunshine and warmer temps and it will be out. I am hoping that a bizarre looking 'six-petalled' Red Trillium which I saw along Spicebush Trail in 2013 reappears in the next week or so.

I stopped at the north end of the park, scanning the bay from the vicinity of the Yacht Club to see if I could find the Eurasian Wigeon. Lots of Redhead, both scaup, Red-breasted Mergansers and a few American Wigeon, Bufflehead and such, but I couldn't come up with the EUWI. But while there, my wife (Marie) passed along the message that Steve Charbonneau and Jim Burk had found a Yellow-throated Warbler and Blue-winged Warbler in the vicinity of Beach Access #1 just shortly before so I packed up my 'scope and headed straight over. Steve and Jim were still there, and after a bit of patient searching both target species reappeared. They were active, usually against bright gray/white skies and too far away for any successful photos at first. However they stuck around the same area, and eventually I saw the YTWA sitting fairly low down in a Red Cedar tree, busily preening. I managed to get a few record shots. Most, but not all, of the others that came along also had decent views of this southern rarity.

There was quite a flurry of bird activity in this area, and a few of us spent well over an hour here. Several Black-and-white, Yellow-rumped, Pine, Nashville and Black-throated Green Warblers were around, in addition to the previously mentioned two. Plus a few Warbling Vireo, a Red-eyed Vireo and first year male Orchard Oriole were busy in the area, making it by far the best concentration of land birds I have had this spring. A Carolina Wren was singing a short distance away in the cottage community.

Eventually I went over to the vicinity of the tennis courts, which was also out of the wind and I thought might have been attractive to a few insects and birds. It was so....another flurry of warblers, probably at least 30 altogether, but no additional species from the previous stop. However some were down a bit lower, such as this male Black-and-white Warbler below.

There was also a Least Flycatcher and Gray Catbird nearby, both FOY for me.

And now for the Wildflower of the Day: the image below is that of Prairie Buttercup (Ranunculus rhomboideus). It was considered a provincially rare species up until a few years ago but has had a few more locations determined for it, so has lost the prestige of being provincially rare. Nonetheless it is limited to open woods where there is little competing vegetation nearby. It seldom gets more than about 6" (15 cm) high and blooms quite early in the spring. There were only two plants in flower in the area I found it, just a bit north of the tennis courts under a rather large oak tree. A similar type of buttercup, Early Buttercup (Ranunculus fascicularis), which has more divided leaves, is common in the picnic area along Rondeau Road.