Saturday, March 8, 2008

Skunk Cabbage

I went for a hike in Boyce Park this morning and towards the end of it, as I was forging Pearson's Run, I came across a patch of Skunk Cabbages (Symplocarpus foetidus) peeking through the oak leaf litter. Naturally I was tempted to pull one up and take it home but I didn't because basically I'm a good person. It has been a relatively cold winter with few warm days and so there are still no leafbuds out, except for the skunk cabbage and some nubs on the wild roses. Not even any mushrooms, no chipmunks or squirrels or deer but a lot of birds singing, especially cardinals, and a flock of about 30 Canada Geese flying north. More information on the skunk cabbage from the US Forest Service.
Although we were supposed to get sleet and freezing rain (what's the difference?) last night, we've only had light mist. The ski and tubing slopes at Boyce are still operating and they have torn up a lot of the land with the construction. They also have put in settling basins that look pretty stagnant so I wonder what their plan is for those and whether any environmentalist was consulted.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

three weeks sans post. come on!