The Urban Pantheist

I haven't dumped the pics from one of my since January. Here are some winter shots. First, Exidia recisa, one of the few mushrooms of winter, here shown slightly frozen.


Some moss, carefully manicured in the cracks between some sidewalk slabs.


One of the urban field markings of European beech is that it usually bears some graffiti. Usually it's initials carved in the smooth bark, so this is a nice variant.

It's good to get some pics of the three of us together, since it doesn't happen all that often.


And then one last pic of something that normal people would think was not worth taking a picture of: an almost perfect disc of moss on a palm stump.

Wilson Mountain Reservation is a protected patch of woods on a stony hill in Dedham. The main entrance has a parking area which is almost always packed with cars full of dog owners taking their pets for a quick ramble up the path, often off-leash. My good friend dedhamoutdoors knows her town well, and took me to the back side of the Reservation, where we didn't see another human or canine soul. Perhaps the persistent light rain helped.

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This is my favorite picture from today's Urban Nature Walk in Forest Park, a huge city park in the third largest city in Massachusetts, Springfield. I grew up two towns away from here, but had never explored it quite like this. Here's my favorite picture from the walk, from about halfway through. But let's see how we got there!

( lots and lots of photos )

A great walk! If you'd like to get in on the action go here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/68443835849/

Ten days ago I took Charlie for a walk in the Stony Brook Reservation, and the woodland wildflowers were starting to come up. This is starflower (Trientalis borealis). Starflower blossoms are seven-pointed stars, pollinated by native bees (not honeybees).

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Yesterday the predicted 4 inches of snow was nowhere to be found. Light flakes melted as the struck the warm ground, and it was actually quite pleasant to be outside. I'm actually too nervous, almost superstitious, to say that I'm happy about this winter's weather--it seems partly like tempting fate and partly like celebrating the good side of something really awful.
But the weather made for a dark but attractive palette. The reddish browns of the leaf litter and the greens of the mosses and lichens were damp and unusually vibrant.

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A downspout feeds a very soft-looking patch of moss.


An American house spider and her egg sac hang in a seldom used doorway.


Not the spider monkey silhouette I wanted, but not bad.

Salmonberry.

This penultimate series of vacation snaps is mostly from in and around Forest Park, which, at "5,100 wooded acres [is] the largest, forested natural area within city limits in the United States." Some are from very close by Council Crest Park, which offers some nice views.
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Alexis and I have an ongoing challenge for ourselves to find the most urban British soldier lichens in Boston. ("Closest to Boston" was how we were phrasing it.) British soldiers (Cladonia cristatella) are charismatic lichens with bright red spore-bearing bodies. Lichens in general are not tolerant of air pollution, and so are more rare in urban and industrial places. Some lichen species are more tolerant than others, and the presence of various species and how well they are thriving can be excellent indicators of air quality.

We found some British soldiers near our place in Brookline, and that stands as the closest to the heart of the city so far. The closeness of the Emerald necklace might help air quality in that neighborhood. The lichen community (with some moss and other organisms) pictured above is from the roof of one of the admissions booths at Franklin Park Zoo. This is the first of this species we've found actually in the City of Boston, though the Brookline patch was actually closer to the middle of the City. Using City Hall Plaza as a landmark, the Brookline lichens were 3.1 miles away while the zoo lichens are 4.6 miles out.

Check out this Oregon Public Television clip about lichens, featuring lj friend omphalina!

p.s. First LJ post from the Dedham House!

Moss and lichen growth on a picnic table in Franklin Park.


A puddingstone boulder (a glacial erratic, or a boulder left over from quarrying operations?) in the woods of Franlin Park.