jilliankern's Favorites

First of all, I did NOT uproot this plant! I found it lying on its side prostrate on the leaf litter just as shown here. I simply lifted in onto the cover of my notebook, so it could be seen easily. Perhaps someone else would like to see what the entire plant looks like, complete with its underground corm and the dry stalk of last year's inflorescence as well as this year's inflorescence full of buds about to open. This uprooted plant lay exactly where a plant grew in each of the preceding three springs. It is in an area, about 25 m in diameter, in which a half dozen other plants of this species are growing this year (and in the past). These other plants are all in good shape this year, full of buds (and a few flowers) early in the season. There was no sign of any animal's disturbance, except for the heavily bruised part of the leaf. Nothing had been eaten (if the missing second leaf was eaten it was cleanly removed from the rest of the plant). It is far from any human traffic (and there was no sign of any human activity nearby). There was a small hole in the soil near the corm, about the right size, so I replanted it (presumably the correct fungus is present) and watered it liberally from my water bottle (see the second photo). May it prosper again!

Two young in nest that a Red-shouldered Hawk pair built in early March as documented on eBird: https://ebird.org/atlasnc/checklist/S103971941

I found the nest during egg laying and incubation and now it has two chicks.

Just thought the arrangement of these pupae was cool

4th outing to vegetation on side of road and near local creek. Sunny, warm day, clear. Pressed way deeper into this site and acally got down to the creek bank by the end of the trip.