December Urban Nature Walk at Great Blue Hill, part two

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This is Monotropa uniflora, a parasitic plant, still identifiable as a wintry corpse.




Moss draws life-giving water from melting snow. A droplet clings to the dried sporangia.


A mollusk (probably a slug) has crawled up this tree, rasping away algae with its radula as it went.


A missing flake of bark from a pitch pine reveals a small wood-boring insect gallery.


This swelling on a scrub oak stem is a gall, probably made by a gall wasp or perhaps a midge.


When they thaw, these Phyllitopsis nidulans mushroom revive. These have a coating of webbing--from a spider, or a mold?


Snowfleas, a type of springtail, are visible on the surface of the snow.


Some naturalists trying to get a better picture of these miniscule animals.