Mid September 2018 - Beauties of the Meadow, Gentians and Ladies' Tresses and more!

September 07  Port Sheldon Natural Area  Ottawa County

Port Sheldon Natural Area has 440 acres including gently rolling terrain, swampy woods, several ponds and Ten Hagen Creek, and wildflowers.

   Virginia Meadow Beauty
This was the main reason I took a walk here in September, to see the beauties of the meadow!  There were hundreds of these plants in various stages of bloom.  I had the whole park to myself, never saw another person.

The Meadow Beauty ring this pond with hundreds of plants.

No blue sky on that day, but the plants were very impressive.

September 10  Black Lake Park   Norton Shores  Muskegon County

Black Lake Park is a 58 acre parcel, located near the southern boundary of Norton Shores, between Wood Road and the eastern shoreline of Little Black Lake. The park provides passive recreation opportunities for nature lovers with a number of bird, animal and plant species to observe.

 Little Black Lake

 First time I have come across a Stinkhorn, and no I didn't give it a sniff.

Bass River Recreation Area - Ottawa County, Michigan - September 11, 2018

 Bass is high on my list of favorite places to explore in Ottawa County.

Bass River Recreation Area, a 1,665-acre site in central Ottawa County, consists of open meadows, open brush land, mature hardwoods, small ponds and 300-acre Max Lake. It has approximately three miles of frontage on the Grand River. The park is used primarily for boating, hiking, mountain biking and horse back riding, as well as hunting.

         Bottle Gentian   
     I think it should be named Stunningly Beautiful Gentian!

    Here at Bass we also find the white variety of the Stunningly Beautiful Gentian

Also in this awesome place we see orchids!  Nodding Ladies' Tresses

We saw a Monarch chrysalis, caterpillar, and adult butterfly.

We even saw two Monarch cocoons on one plant, and nearby two caterpillars on one plant.  I tried to capture it in a photo, it isn't very clear so I circled each in red.  Caterpillars on the left, cocoons on the right.  There were aphids covering the plant stems.

 Mike and I have been keeping up our evening walks, usually at Connor Bayou, occasionally we head to Hofma Park and Preserve.  September 15 we walked at Hofma Preserve, again, no blue sky but some of the trees were showing just a bit of color. 

Next time I will finish up the month of September, and soon we should be seeing the fall colors!  Thanks for stopping by.

Allegan County Michigan Wild Orchids and More

Allegan County, Michigan has wonderful places to explore!  Last year, Marie and I visited "Happy Boots" and found 19 Purple Fringed Orchids in the wet woods that we named Happy Boots. 

So after a very difficult spring and early summer, we finally had the opportunity to explore and Happy Boots was the place.  It is just part of Allegan State Game Area, used for hunting, hiking, skiing, and for us, wildflowering.

It felt great to be back in the woods, looking for purple among the ferns, Lizard Tail, Touch-Me-Not, Tulip Trees, so much green!  So many plants, such fun!  We didn't find 19 this year, I think it was 11 - Purple Fringed Orchids, but that was just fine.

 
 Also in Allegan County, we stopped by Goose Lake.  The water was way down this year, so we were able to walk where there had been water the year before.  It was very interesting to see the plants and frogs and butterflies that live here.  And, of course, we saw hundreds of Meadow Beauty!
 

 Pickerelweed
 
 Funnel Web Spider

 
 

Beautiful day.  Thanks Marie for taking me!