Trees
October 28, 2015
(with a brief update for November 6, 2015)
It was just a few days before Halloween and the end of
October. After a long, dry period we had rain in the morning and all of the day
before. It was a steady rain but not heavy, and not enough to fill Cottonwood
Pond or the Creek. It also wasn't enough to encourage fungi to finally manifest
as mushrooms, but the tougher shelf fungi were a little more pliable than they
had been in a long time.
Turkey
Tail fungus
Mosses had brightened up, though.
There was a chorus of many birds in the distance (mostly at
the far edge between woods and farm field), mingling with the constant, almost
electronic-sounding waver of crickets nearby. I could hear a Red-Bellied
Woodpecker chattering in the canopy, as well as the chipping of a Cardinal.
The Canopy.
This is the origination of the leaves that had fallen and
gathered on the woods floor as well as in the bottom of the bowl of earth I
call Cottonwood Pond. There was still a lot of green in the woods, but the
canopy was filling with bright, fiery autumn colors. Here is where migrating
flocks of birds would be foraging through, collecting insects and larvae from
leaves and branches and probing through tree bark. Some year-round and resident
birds, such as Carolina Chickadee, Tufted Titmouse, White-Breasted Nuthatch and
Brown Creeper, would be doing the same, preparing for winter. This is where the
Red-Bellied and other Woodpeckers would be pounding holes in search of insects
and calling from the dense crowns of the trees.
Look carefully to see a Red-Bellied Woodpecker
against the tree trunk
The Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker would be arriving to spend the
winter tapping neat little holes in neat horizontal rows across tree trunks,
then taking up the leaking sap with their tongues. This is also where owls
would be blending into tree limbs and holes, and where squirrels were
skittering from tree to tree across branches, chattering. Their actions would
help some autumn leaves loose their hold on twigs, just at the right moment of
readiness, and drift down to Cottonwood Pond.
Cottonwood Pond, as seen from the south
Around Cottonwood Pond, which is in a low area at the bottom
of the woods (a creek runs through it), we find the trees that don't mind
having their “feet” wet. The soil is always wet here and sometimes even quite
water-logged and swampy.
There are, of course, the Cottonwoods. Cottonwood Pond was
formed when a huge Eastern Cottonwood tree fell over, leaving a big bowl where
the roots had been.That Root Ball is ample evidence that Cottonwood does not
need to send its roots far down. The Eastern Cottonwood (Populus deltoides)
is always associated with water and is intolerant to shade, so this wet, open bottom
area of our woods is perfect for them (I first became familiar with them as a
child, when a large one grew at the edge of the woods behind out back yard, in
a very wet, swampy area.) They have the fastest rate of growth of any tree
native to the U.S. (5-6 feet per year), but are not long survivors. According
to Sally Weeks, “recently dead trees with sloughing bark” can be homes for
“maternity colonies of Indiana bats.” Maybe I need to observe our fallen
Cottonwood Trunk more closely.
Around the fallen Cottonwood are scrappy Boxelder (Acer
negundo) saplings with their green stems. Also called Ashleaf Maple, it's
the only member of the Maple group with compound leaves. The groups of leaflets
resemble those of Poison Ivy. This is another fast-growing, moisture-loving,
short-lived tree. One sapling grows next to the fallen trunk at the far end of
“little pond.”
Also growing right up against Cottonwood Pond (mostly near
the southeast end of the Root Ball) are American Elderberry shrubs (Sambucus
nigra.) The clusters of white flowers and dark purple fruits both have
great medicinal value as well as food value for wildlife. I can easily find the
shrubs in winter because the tan trunks and branches are dotted with raised
bumps called lenticels.
In the wet vicinity of Cottonwood Pond stand my favorite
native trees, the Sycamores (Platanus occidentalus.) I never tire
of seeing their patchwork trunks where bark peels off revealing different
colors, looking like camo, then giving way to the shimmering white, majestic
trunks rising above.
Sycamore seen in the middle
The fuzzy seed balls stay on the tree all winter, but later I
find them, or their loosened, fuzzy seeds, on the ground and on top of the
water. Sycamores have the largest diameter trunks of any deciduous trees in
North America, so there are some real giants across the country. Their bases
often show large, contorted roots scrambling over creek banks where water has
eroded the soil and exposed the roots. Giant spaces provide shelter for various
water animals.
Willows also love to grow in wet places, but so far in my
woods I've only identified the non-native Hybrid Crack Willow (Salix x
rubens), or White Crack Willow – at least that's what I think they are.
They are short-lived and break easily, so that many of the exist as fallen,
splintered logs in my woods. I would love to get the native Black Willow (Salix
nigra) started in these woods. It is plentiful in other wet areas of Knox
County and really ought to be flourishing near Cottonwood Pond.
Blue Beech (Carpinus caroliniana) does flourish in the
bottom area of our woods, very near Cottonwood Pond. The one I call Bent Blue
Beech grows at the edge of the pond and reaches over and beyond the Root Ball.
Its main trunk is showing decay and damage, but there are
many sprouts growing up from it.
It's a small tree with distinctive bark that gives it another
common name, Musclewood, and very hard wood that earned it the common name
Ironwood. It is also called American Hornbeam. Nesting songbirds like the Blue
Beech's many small limbs, and the seeds are eaten by a number of wildlife. Its
yellow autumn leaves turn dark bronze and tend to hang on into winter.
The White Ash (Fraxinus americana) flourishes down
there, too. In fact, the Two-Trunk Tree next to the Isthmus is a White Ash, as
well as the young tree at the pond's edge near the Barkless Log, and there's a
White Ash sapling growing from the top edge of the Root Ball.
Two Sugar Maple leaves cling to the side of the
Two-Trunk White Ash tree next to Cottonwood Pond
It's the most common Ash in Indiana and the Midwest, but is
heavily threatened these days by the Emerald Ash Borer (though the White Ash
trees in my woods seem unaffected, so far.) According to one of my sources, it
does not tolerate much wet. The ones around Cottonwood Pond would beg to
disagree.
Sugar Maples (Acer saccharum) don't grow so much in
the soaked ground, but they do like moist soil, and so they commonly grow in
the vicinity of Cottonwood Pond. One sapling grows from the top edge of the
Root Ball (a Northern Water Snake was wound around it in May of 2014 – see “A
Visit to the Pond with Cherie”) and the mature Sugar Maples nearby send their
distinctive “helicopter” seeds down to the surface of Cottonwood Pond and all
around. The trees provide dense canopy and shade, blazing fall color, and a
dense layer of leaf litter below. The fallen leaves break down quickly.
The bright colors of Sugar Maple trees on the
slope near Cottonwood Pond
Hackberry trees (Celtis occientalis) are nearby,
preferring the well-drained bottom lands. They are so easy to identify in
winter because of their strange, rough, corky, dimpled bark. The dark berries
remain on the trees well into winter, providing food to birds, but after
falling they are favored by Wild Turkeys, which are occasionally in my woods.
The leaves are often riddled with “nipple galls”, caused by a mite, but do not
harm the tree.
Trees on the slopes, ridge-tops and edge of our woods create
more canopy, more shade, more wildlife food, and more leaf litter. Leaves from
all of them drift over and down to Cottonwood Pond in the autumn, making for a
woods floor and pond bottom of varied texture and design. Some of the trees
are:
Northern Red Oak (Quercus rubra) – a two-trunk Red Oak
up the slop from Cottonwood Pond provides the resting place for the top of the
fallen Cottonwood.
White Oak (Quercus alba) – some of the largest, oldest
trees in my woods.
Leaves of Oak trees turning red in the canopy
Tulip Poplar/Tuliptree/Yellow Poplar (Liriodendron
tulipifera) – tall, straight, handsome trees with colorful, tullip-shaped
flowers. I find the seed “cones” and scattered, individual seeds all over the
woods floor, on the pond water, on the pond bottom and on top of logs. They are
numerous and persistent. This is the Indiana state tree.
Sassafrass (Sassafras albidum) – with its dark fruit,
leaves of three shapes, and distinctively flavored medicine in all part of the
tree.
Black Cherry (Prunus serotina) – with its dark, scaly
bark that, in our woods, seems a favorite of Pileated Woodpeckers and Yellow-Bellied
Sapsuckers.
Persimmon (Diospyros virginiana) – with succulent
fruits enjoyed by wildlife (I often find little piles of seeds on fallen logs,
or in animal scat.)
Slippery Elm (Ulmus rubra) – with its slanted-based,
rough leaves.
Bitternut Hickory (Carya cordiformis) – I often wonder
what wildlife actually like the nuts of this tree, since I find so many of them
scattered an uneaten.
There are others, of course, including Redbud, Paw-paw,
Shingle Oak and Black Walnut. Some like the far edges of our woods and don't
much affect Cottonwood Pond, directly.
Even the dead trees serve many purposes. Many tiny animal
species live in the old bark and wood, helping to break it down (the Very
Rotten Log across the Creek and Cottonwood Pond is quickly turning to mush) and
some other animals eat those animals.
I often run across soft, rotting wood that has been pawed
into, possibly by a skunk, to get to the tiny critters.
Some old wood becomes homes for birds and other animals.
Some dead, dying or broken trees quickly grow new saplings.
The three-pronged Blue Beech sapling growing from the Root Ball
A broken Sycamore readily grows new saplings
Tree trunks and old logs also support colonies of fungi, moss
and lichen, which in turn provide food, and sometimes shelter, to small
animals, and places for seeds of other plants to take hold.
Lichen
Moss
Below the canopy is the understory layer of the woods, full
of saplings, shrubs and some vines. Small birds flit around in this layer near
the pond.
Roots, rootlets and exposed root balls provide shelter and
food. Birds land on them and hunt for bugs, tiny animals (micro fauna) create
tunnels, and havens are provided for frogs, toads, turtles and others. Fungi,
moss and lichen all flourish on them.
Rootlets hanging from the Root Ball over the
Cove, with spider webs above
The top side of the Root Ball, which tends to stay wetter and
shadier, often sports mushrooms, green plants and many gnats.
Root Ball Top
The bottom, which is more exposed to the sun, tends to grow
lichen in pale brushes of blue-green.
Root Ball Bottom over dry Pond, with some of Root
Ball Top seen to the left
The woods floor is a dense network of activity, mostly going
unnoticed by humans. Tiny spiders scamper over the top. Voles burrow below.
Birds such as Eastern Towhees scratch the leaf litter vigorously to find bugs.
Barely visible or invisible (to the naked eye) life forms break down the layers
of leaves into soil.
Some types of tree leaves decompose faster than others. Under
the top layer, holes in and along the edges of leaf blades, created by insects
and mites, allow fungi and bacteria to enter the leaf interior. Deeper down,
skeletonized leaves are dark and slimy from a coating of microorganisma. Deeper
yet, humus is being formed and the leaves are barely recognizable. At the
bottom is the soil, the “repository for atoms of decomposed plants and
animals.” Strands of fungal mycelium and mycorrhizal fungi lace through rotten
leaves and wood. The cycle, the process from trees to soil, is complex,
constant, and utterly fascinating. Through this, the varied leaves of the
mighty trees become the basic, life-giving soil layer that feeds the same
trees.
One of my plans this year is to make a Berlese Funnel that I
can use to find out what creatures are inhabiting the soil and leaf litter
around Cottonwood Pond.
In studying more about the forest floor, I wondered what
effect the extended dry period might be having. This would also apply to the
pond bottom, where leaves had been falling on a dry surface. I learned
from the book Eastern Forests
(Kricher and Morrison) that,
“Rainwater
contributes both hydrogen and oxygen to the soil ... Hydrogen atoms... replace, or exchange, with atoms such as
calcium and potassium that are electrostatically attached to particles of clay.
The calcium and other minerals removed by rainfall are washed or 'leached' into
lower soil layers. As hydrogen accumulates, the soil becomes increasingly
acidic … Leaf decomposition … also adds to the acidity of soils. The more
acidic a soil is, the more slowly decomposition will occur, since acidity
retards both the growth and activity of microorganisms.”
Normally, we have some healthy rainfall during autumn. If more acidic soil results in slower
decomposition, then how did our dry period affect the soil acidity and
decomposition in and around Cottonwood Pond, if at all? Or did the amount of
rainfall earlier in the year and the length of the dry period even out, anyway?
Certainly, I see slower decomposition on the top layer of leaves when things
are dry, but what about in the lower leaf litter layers, and in the soil?
Another affect of the dry period is that I don't see as many
isopods (which breathe via gills), earthworms, slugs, snails and millipedes.
Are they just all much further down in the layers, or hidden in damper places
elsewhere, or does this affect their population numbers and abilities to
survive and reproduce? I could certainly tell that the mushrooms have not been
encouraged, either, but there is always hope in their network of mycelium in
the soil and under bark.
And, in the bowl of earth that is usually a little pond, how
will things be different, as dry leaves fall on a dry surface, to be covered by
water at a later date, instead of
falling on the water surface and gradually sinking? Certainly, they will
take longer to decompose. The dampness from the rain of this day would make
some little difference, but nothing like leaves on and in a body of water.
In that way, the colors, shapes and patterns in leaves of
trees surrounding Cottonwood Pond should remain evident a little longer.
Eastern Forests (Peterson Field Guides); John C. Kricher and
Gordon Morrison; Houghton Mifflin Company; 1988.
Native Trees of the Midwest; Sally S. Weeks, Harmon P. Weeks,
Jr. and George R. Parker; Purdue University Press; 2012.
Shrubs and Woody Vines of Indiana and the Midwest; Sally S.
Weeks and Harmon P. Weeks, Jr.; Purdue University Press; 2012.
101 Trees of Indiana: A Field Guide; Marion T. Jackson;
Indiana University Press; 2004.
Update
November 6, 2015
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