NEBC MEETING NEWS

Abstract

June 2019. The New England Botanical Club held its June away meeting at the Vermont Grange Center, in Brookfield, Vermont, and included a weekend full of activities from June 14 to 16. Friday arrivals enjoyed a potluck dinner together. On Saturday morning, Ernie Schori cooked up breakfast and everyone headed out to a field trip or workshop. Charley Eiseman gave a most interesting workshop on galls, leaf mines, and other signs of herbivorous insects, introducing participants to arthropods that feed on plants. Participants learned to identify a number of insects and arachnids, many of which can be identified to species by the plant host and type of damage. Art Gilman led a field trip to Berlin Pond where the group studied willows, including Salix bebbiana, S. discolor, S. eriocephala, S. nigra, S. petiolaris, S. sericea, and one probable hybrid with the persistent stipules of S. eriocephala and the abundant, silky hairs on the abaxial leaf surfaces of S. sericea. They also visited a fern hotspot with Goldie’s fern (Dryopteris goldieana), bulblet-bladder fern (Cystopteris bulbifera), maidenhair fern (Adiantum pedatum), and a hybrid of male fern (Dryopteris filix-mas) and marginal fern (D. marginalis); long known as Vermont fern and now called Jim Montgomery’s fern (D. 3 montgomeryi). They ended the day at Williamstown Gulf, a deep north-south chasm created by glacial meltwater where they explored a very rich northern hardwood community. The group found Wherry’s hybrid woodfern (Dryopteris3 neowherryi [D. goldiana3marginalis]) and a large population of glade fern (Homalosorus pycnocarpon), along with numerous rich woods species. Brett Engstrom took a group to Chickering Bog Natural Area (an intermediate fen) and then to Calais Town Forest. On the trail hike to the fen, Brett and others pointed out features of the northern forest (moose tracks, abundant white spruce, a millipede that smells like almonds) and interesting species: Carex peckii (historical in Massachusetts), Lobaria pulmonaria (lung lichen), and deer truffles Elaphomyces granulatus. The fen was stunning, with flowering Sarracenia purpurea (purple pitcherplant), Utricularia (bladderworts) and Tricophorum alpinum (alpine sedge). Sedges observed included the beautiful Carex limosa, C. peckii, C. palescens, C. aquatilis, and C. lasiocarpa, among others. The highlight of the trip was seeing Pyrola asarifolium (pink pyrola).