Jar of Goodness 10.30.22: Gans Creek

. . . The weekly virtual “gratitude jar.”

This week, I’m expressing thanks for Gans Creek Wild Area.

I’ll never get tired of this view.

Gans Creek is part of Rock Bridge Memorial State Park. I’ve been going there for hikes since the place opened in about 1981. It’s always been a favorite hiking place of mine. Lots and lots of my early journal entries begin “At Gans, at my outlook.”

I had to call it “my outlook” and “my precipice” because that was before anyone declared that it should be named “Shooting Star Bluff.”

Indeed—this was so long ago, there was a sea of perennial wildflowers, yes, called shooting stars, that quite literally carpeted the triangle of ground between the main trail and the V of trail leading to and from the outlook. It was a magical scene each April, with them and bird’s-foot violets all over that outlook.

The shooting stars, violets, and all their topsoil are a memory now at that spot; it’s been trampled to death.

I don’t go to Gans nearly as often as I used to. The old field at the beginning of the trail has turned into second-growth woodland characterized by cedars and autumn olive.

But the older forested areas along the bluffs still feel like a home to me, and it was good to visit the place last Thursday.

Jar of Goodness 8.28.22: Native Prairies

. . . The weekly virtual “gratitude jar.”

This week, I’m expressing thanks for Missouri’s native tallgrass prairies.

We visited Friendly Prairie and Paintbrush Prairie today (they’re both south of Sedalia). It’s always good to see the flowers.

From a distance, the staggering variety of plants just doesn’t register. You have to wade in there in order to start really seeing things. Each time I go to Friendly Prairie, I see some new plant I didn’t know before. Maybe it should be renamed “Making New Friends Prairie.”

Today’s new friend is slickseed wild bean, Strophostyles leiosperma. I think. There are a few other species in that genus that occur in Missouri, and my pictures don’t show all the characters definitively, but that’s what my money’s on.

I was wading through the grasses, and I just looked down and saw its delicate little tendrils and soft, hairy trifoliate leaves, with oval leaflets, and I thought, What is this new little pea plant? The pods of this demure little legume were only slightly longer than an inch.

Here’s a picture of the prairie taken straight ahead, at eye level. My eyes are well over 5 feet above the ground. The tall stalks are big bluestem (good ol’ Andropogon gerardii), the prime tall grass of the tallgrass prairie. Its flower stalks can reach 8 feet high. Sue’s dad, having read many accounts of pioneers and settlers, used to talk about how crazy it was just to think of American grasses so high. A native of Ohio, he had not ever really seen the tallgrass prairie. So I took lots of pictures like this for him. See? See how high they are? So I still take these pictures.

At Paintbrush Prairie, I noticed an American bluehearts plant abloom. I’ve seen it at Friendly, but not at Paintbrush. Bluehearts is one of those MUAH! *chef’s kiss* wildflowers that pretty much only grow on high-quality native prairie. It’s also a semiparasitic plant, attaching to other plants (usually trees and other woody plants) via the roots and swiping nutrients. Unlike a lot of other parasitic plants, bluehearts does have green chlorophyll and can live okay without a host. And here’s another thing, per MDC’s Field Guide page, “Prairies, by definition, have very few trees. But historically, Missouri’s prairies, glades, savannas, and open woodlands formed a patchwork of open, grassy habitats that were kept open by occasional fires.” You can bet American bluehearts used to take advantage of that patchwork.

American bluehearts is one of the several caterpillar host plants for buckeye butterflies. Yay! And indeed, I saw a common buckeye not long after I spied the bluehearts! Yay! It was on top of a pretty curlytop ironweed plant. Yay! . . . But, hey, it wasn’t moving . . .

Turns out a crab spider was having a happy hunting day! I’m thinking this is a whitebanded crab spider (Misumenoides formosipes) but don’t quote me on that. . . . But yeah, I know. Sad day for the butterfly. But I did notice the butterfly was pretty beat up. Let’s hope it got to mate and create the next generation before its final stroke of luck.

On the subject of insects, there were a lot of grasshoppers flicking around. I managed to capture a picture of this one. No, I don’t know what it is. It’s a juvenile something-something. My first guess is two-striped grasshopper, Melanoplus bivittatus, but seriously, hell’s out for recess on this ID.

Finally, the picture at the top of this post is of wholeleaf rosinweed. It’s sort of become my favorite rosinweed because, well, it don’t get no respect. Unlike compass plant (look at those huge, flat, deeply lobed basal leaves!) . . . and carpenter weed (look at those square stems and opposite, perfoliate leaves!) . . . and prairie dock (look at those gigantic, smooth flower stalks, and those enormous basal leaves!) . . . wholeleaf rosinweed apparently gets written off as “some kind of” sunflower. Its leaves are, well, leaf-shaped.

So that’s the report for today. It’s mainly pictures. If I get behind in posting, it might be that when I’m not working, I’m just out trying to have fun, seeing what I can see. I'm sure you understand.

Jar of Goodness 6.5.22: Butterflies of June

. . . The weekly virtual “gratitude jar.”

This week, I’m expressing thanks for the butterflies of June.

Really, anyplace flowers are blooming, this time of year, you’ll see butterflies. But today we saw them at Painted Rock Conservation Area; along the drive to the main parking lot, there’s a glade vegetation planting with lots of coneflowers, butterfly weed, and more.

So here are some pictures of a silvery checkerspot and great spangled fritillary. There were many, both butterflies and flowers.

And it just felt magical.

Jar of Goodness 4.10.22: Prairie Dogtooth Violets

. . . The weekly virtual “gratitude jar.”

This week, I’m expressing thanks for prairie dogtooth violets. The official name is Erythronium mesochoreum.

Although prairies are in my genetics, I grew up spending much more time in wooded Ozark landscapes. So the dogtooth violets I adored were the woodland species called white dogtooth violet, Erythronium albidum.

The prairie dogtooth violet is a newer friend and companion, one that lives on prairies and glades. It’s not mottled like its woodsy cousin, and it has several other distinctions as well.

So today, we visited Friendly Prairie, south of Sedalia, where they’ve recently done a controlled burn. That got rid of all the built-up dry grassy thatch, so the shrimpy little early-spring wildflowers are peeping up out of the moonscape, getting all the pollinators to themselves.

Did you know there is at least one species of native andrenid bee that specializes in visiting dogtooth violets? Sheesh. If any of those visited that prairie today, they were in heaven. HEA-VAN.

Did you know that the presence of prairie dogtooth violet is a good indicator that the land, where they’re growing, might never have been plowed? Ever?

It was a windy, blustery day, and the gusts swept right over the prairie parcel. The hundreds, thousands of little bell-shaped lily flowers shook and waved. Somehow I kept expecting them to make a tinkling sound.

Anyway, it was a really special day. Palm Sunday—while others were waving palm leaves, I watched these humble lilies wiggle in the undying wind. It was The Day of the Prairie Dogtooth Violets, and one I’ll never forget.

If you want to learn more about prairie dogtooth violet (and there’s lots of cool information to learn), see this page, which I might have had something to do with.

Jar of Goodness 4.3.22: The Violets of April

. . . The weekly virtual “gratitude jar.”

This week, I’m expressing thanks for April flowers, specifically violets.

Did you know that seventeen species of violets have been recorded in Missouri? In recent years (like, the past decade or so), I’ve been taking pictures of our different violets as I encounter them. I’ve posted photos of violets—mostly different variations of the common violet (Viola sororia) that grow in our yard—on my blog before.

In early April, it’s still kind of early for a lot of violets, but I know they’re coming, and I relish the opportunity to enjoy them again.

Here are some of my catches.

In 2017, I was really jazzed up to discover this violet, which is uncommon. It’s the plains violet or wayside violet, Viola viarum. There’s a population growing amid rock riprap in a small creek bed near the Katy Trail somewhere in this state. (I’m not saying where.) Most of the violets I’d seen until then had round or heart-shaped leaves, so the leaves of this violet kind of blew my mind.

Once my eyes were opened to that, I started looking more closely at violets. Only about a week later, I found that species’ doppelganger, cleft violet (Viola palmata). It was growing along a gravel roadway on my cousin’s property in Moniteau County. The leaves are really variable on both these species, but the main distinction is that cleft violet has hairy leaves, while plains violet is glabrous.

That same spring, while I was taking pictures of violets willy-nilly, I also took some pictures of Missouri violet (Viola missouriesis), which has distinctively elongated, heart-shaped leaves, whose outer third is not serrated like the rest of the leaf is. The flowers are said to be more of a lilac hue that the similar common violet, with a slightly darker ring around the pale throat.

While I’m on the subject of violets with weird leaves, here’s the only halfway decent picture I have (so far) of an arrow-leaved violet (Viola sagittata), taken on a prairie south of Sedalia in 2012. The flower of this species isn’t anything unusual, but the leaves are remarkable and, among our violets, unique.

In the woodsy-woods in springtime, you should always be on the lookout for yellow violets (Viola pubescens. This is possibly one of our most pleasing violets.

Then there’s pale violet, or cream violet (Viola striata). I don’t think I’ve ever seen this species in nature, but we have scads of it in our yard. I think Grandma or her parents must have introduced it and cultivated it.

Another violet that grows for free in our yard is field pansy, or Johnny-jump-up (Viola bicolor). Unlike the others I’m showing you, this is an annual, and kind of weedy. It volunteers and reseeds in our yard. I’ve seen it growing along the Katy Trail, too. It’s pretty cute, with pansy-like faces.

Well, I’m all enthused now about the possibility of taking some more pictures of violets. I’d like to improve on some of the pictures I’ve taken so far (such as bird’s-foot violet, the queen of eastern North American violets), and I’d like to locate some of the other violet species I haven’t seen yet. Some of that will require traveling to the eastern Ozarks. At least one is found on prairies.

Mainly, though, I’m just enthused about seeing violets, and other wildflowers, in general. Who knows what else I’ll find while I’m at it?

Forcing Violets

Are you ready for spring yet? I am.

Back in November and December, this winter was really slow to start, but now that we’ve finally started getting frozen precipitation, we can’t seem to shake it off. We finally got a big snow dump in the middle of January. Then it mostly melted, and then we got more on the first of February. Then that was mostly gone, and now we had snow again on the seventeenth. It wasn’t a lot of snow, but around here it is underlain by about three-fourths of an inch of grainy, icy sleet, which has formed a stubborn, un-shovelable layer on the sidewalks. Geez.

Each time we have gotten snow, people have dutifully cleared roads and parking lots, and we’ve shoveled our sidewalks and driveway and steps (yeah, we have lots of sidewalks, since we live on a corner). In the process, we’ve all created little hills of snow, which last forever, especially where it’s shady.

So, since the first big snow in January, we’ve never really completely gotten rid of the snow before the next dump. This has become kind of unusual for us, especially this late in the year. In fact, in recent years, the middle of February is when I start removing dead plant material from our flower beds, so the daffodils and such can come up in the clear. Because by mid-February, our daffodils are coming; indeed, the ones in front by the house are already at least four inches tall. The front of our house faces due southwest, so it’s sunbaked and amazingly warm, especially as the light and heat are reflected of the front of the house, so those daffodils are practically in a greenhouse, essentially “forced” to develop and bloom ahead of their compatriots elsewhere.

And that’s what I’m getting to: forcing flowers in springtime. It’s really popular to “force” into bloom various bulbs such as narcissus (those extremely fragrant “paperwhites,” for example), other daffodils, and hyacinths. Professionals force them in greenhouses for the trade. Go to your local grocery store floral department and you’ll see examples.

But it’s possible to force plants you find in nature, or in your backyard.

NOTE THAT I AM NOT SUGGESTING YOU DIG WILD PLANTS FROM PUBLIC LANDS OR FROM PROPERTY THAT ISN’T YOURS. . . . Please behave!

But you know . . . our backyard is the opposite of a golf course. And it’s not natural, either. Yards like ours have been called “freedom lawns,” since they’re free of pesticides, herbicides, and unnatural monocultures of high-maintenance turfgrasses. Admittedly, along with our smattering of various lawn grasses, we also have invasive star-of-Bethlehem and a variety of nuisance nonnatives and natives, such as Indian strawberry, creeping Charlie/ground ivy, field pansy, plantains, and common violets of various colors.

It’s the last one that I’m “forcing” this winter. The common violets that grow all over in our backyard develop rather coarse rhizomes at least about an inch long. As a kid digging in the soil of my parents’ backyard, I fancied these were like tiny iris bulbs, and I treasured them.

And I still treasure them; I have a hard time treating them like weeds, so when I’m working in a flower bed, such as my herb garden, I tend to pull out the violet rhizomes and transplant them elsewhere. Can’t bear to toss them into the composter. I really love violets.

So last week, before the latest snow event occurred, I knew where to go in the backyard with my trowel to find a nice big violet rhizome to dig up. I planted it in some fancy potting soil at the bottom of a small fishbowl-shaped, bubble-ball glass vase.

I’m giving it plenty of water, and it gets oodles of sunshine in our front windows. On gray days, I stick it under an intense desk lamp.

And here’s what we’ve got so far. It’s making me happy!

And for the record, here’s where the idea came from: Leonard Hall’s A Journal of the Seasons on an Ozark Farm (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1980), 207.

Violets Variation

Happy spring! For me, the preeminent flower of springtime is the violet: the ubiquitous "common violet" (Viola sororia) that grows in yards that are not poisoned by chemicals on a regular basis.

The taxonomy of these free and pretty little jewels has apparently given botanists fits. George Yatskievych, in Steyermark's Flora of Missouri vol. 3, summarizes "the tortuous nomenclatural history (and longest synonymy)" of this highly variable species. The species (as it's understood today, for now) differs in amount of hairiness, colors and color patterns on the petals, and lobing of leaves. Some apparently are not 100 percent wild; cultivated forms exist. I think that's what we have in our yard, mostly.

One reason, he says, for the variation and confusion might be because this species might hybridize with closely related violet species, but also that, because these violets also can create viable seeds from cleistogamous (non-opening, self-pollinating) flowers, an unusual specimen may easily reproduce its own weird genetic line in an area, filling the vicinity with its own non-sexually-reproduced offspring (basically clones of the parent plant).

I have kind of given up on trying to key out violets because of these differences. Every time I read technical and even nontechnical treatments of Missouri's violets, I get confused. It doesn't help that older references have them divided up into different species that newer references don't recognize.

But mostly, I simply hesitate to do the serious work in keying out the plants: picking and teasing and pulling apart the flowers, for instance. It pains me even to run the lawn mower over them. And they only last for a few months in the springtime.

So I will just enjoy them and let them be. They are a central reason I don't treat my lawn with weed killers.

Here's a little portfolio of the violets that grow in our yard. Enjoy!

First, some pictures of some "unusual" blue violets I transplanted them to Missouri from Sue's parents' yard in northern Ohio in May 2016, right after Mr. Ferber passed away. These rather pale violets are the most common type up there! Their yard is full of these violets. For all I know, they might be a different species. Anyway, the two little clumps I brought home have gotten pretty well established. I wonder if they're breeding with the other violets in our yard?

Next, the standard plain purple violets; most of the violets in our yard are these.

The next most common kind of violet in our yard are the "Confederate" violets, which Yatskievych calls Viola sororia f. priceana, "a form with grayish white corollas marked with violet or blue veins and sometimes also the lower petal spotted or mottled with purple." He says if you see any growing in a natural area, they are probably "plants that have escaped from cultivation rather than truly native occurrences."

Here is a typical purple and a Confederate together:

This year, I've noticed we seem to have a lot of variation in the "Confederate" violets. Yatskievych says, "Where such plants grow within natural populations of plants with bluish purple petals, individuals with intermediate corolla color patterns may also occur."

So here are some examples. First, some "regular" Confederates:

Then, there are some that look especially dark:

And here's one that seemed to have very pronounced dark veins:

On the other hand, here's one that's remarkably pale, but still with the "Confederate" patterning:

And I could only find a single pure white violet. Its stems and leaves are pure green, lacking the kind of reddish tinge the purple violets can have. And the petals are pure white. Sorry my photo's so lame. If it blooms again, I'll try to take a better picture. But you can get the idea even from this shitty out-of-focus photo.

(Really, I should be ashamed of myself for even posting this piece-of-crap photo...)

Finally, there is a different species of violet that occurs in our yard, and it's clearly separate. This one is Viola striata, the pale violet or cream violet. It has aerial stems (that have alternate leaves and flowers coming off of it) as opposed to having each leaf stem and each flower stem arising directly from the rhizome (like the other yard violets do). The flowers are narrower, and the stipules on the aerial stems are distinctly fringed with deep lobes or teeth (they look kind of comblike). The lower petal usually has dark purple veins (I guess that explains the species name, striata). Here are a couple views of it.

My Other Life

For those of you who are my friends and family, you may be interested in the links I'm providing in this post. I keep my work life separate from my blog, and from everything else personal, but for those of you who have missed me (and may miss my posts again, the next time I get all busy with work), if you want to see more of what I've been "up to," then check out the online field guide of the Missouri Department of Conservation.



When I started working on this project, the MDC folks asked me if I wanted to be identified publicly as a "field guide maven," and I said no. I'm an editor, right? I'm not a "writer"!! (Okay, I guess I am, now, aren't I.) And I certainly don't want my sad-looking mugshot next to anything on this online field guide. It's all about the plants and animals! But my friends, and family--if you ever want to know what I'm "up to," look at this site.


(Muskrat photo by Susan Ferber.)

It's basically 10 field guides in one: aquatic invertebrates, insects, butterflies and moths, fishes, amphibians and reptiles, birds, mammals, mushrooms, wildflowers and nonwoody plants, and trees/shrubs/woody vines. You can search on it via an alphabetical browse menu, or you can do an "advanced search" that allows you to narrow search results using key identifying characteristics (such as color, habitat, etc.).

This summer, I've been particularly busy fulfilling entries on the wildflowers and other nonwoody plants. (It's still going to be a while before I post a bunch of grasses and ferns--surely you can see why those present special problems for writing a guide for nonscientific readers.) Here's a link to the "browse" page for the wildflowers. It's an alphabetical listing; just scroll down, then click on the next page, etc. There's close to 300 species entries for this group, with more a-comin'.

Also, in the browse menus, when a plant or animal strikes your fancy, click on that image to see the complete entry for that species. Here, for example, is a recent entry I did, for Giant Ragweed. You know this plant; you've seen it a million times. But have you really seen it? Part of the satisfaction of creating this field guide is in thinking, really thinking, about some of the most minute aspects of these organisms. What sets it apart from others of its kind? Why should anyone care about it? Why does it possess its unique characteristics?



I love it when I can include information that is particular to Missouri, the Ozarks, the tallgrass prairie. I guess because of my own local pride. Like how the word "cooter" came from Africa and then became a verb in Ozark dialect. And every time I write about a prairie wildflower, I think of how they must have cheered settlers as they headed west into such strange, treeless terrain.

It's especially been fascinating to include "human connections" and "ecosystem connections" for each species. What has amazed me is how nearly every single species in the state, whether it's a weird mushroom, or a nondescript rodent, a ubiquitous roadside wildflower, or even a minnow, a wicked-looking insect that hides under rocks in a stream, or a type of insect that's so damn common you don't give a second thought to it, has an interest on a human level and on the level of its relationship to nature. That's just incredibly cool, I think.



Honestly--sometimes the hardest thing about this project is to keep from writing too much. There's no end to the fascination in the natural world.



Anyway--enough of "tooting my own horn." But I did want to let y'all know that I haven't exactly been absent from the Internets--just from my blog. If you ever miss me (you know who you are!), check out the MDC field guide, where you'll find out what I've been doing in "my other life."