Native plants on the woodland walk
I take a walk in the woods to explore the native wildflowers. Trilliums, Marsh Marigolds, Wild Geraniums, Mayapples, Forget-me-nots and a host of others that we can use in our own woodland gardens.
“May your life be like a wildflower, growing freely in the beauty and joy of each day.”
As May fades into June, the Trilliums too, begin to fade from their stark white stage, to a lovely shade of pink. Not to be mistaken by the vibrant colours of the red trillium or Wake Robin pictured farther down.
Trilliums, cranesbill, violets and Redbuds: Rooted in the woodlands
Part Two of the series
Most people enjoy a walk in the woodland. They marvel at the discovery of a favourite wildflower, shrub or flowering tree growing deep in the forest.
In many places around the world, those same plants growing in a front garden become the talk of the neighbourhood, often bringing HOA administrators or city inspectors to tell the homeowners to cut these same plants down, or worse, rip them out and replace them with tidy non-native plants that they all know and love.
Is it the plants that are the problem, or where they are growing? should it even matter?
Wild violets early bloomers
Yes, the same violets that neighbours work so hard to keep out of their barren yards of turf grass are among the first blooming native woodland wildflowers.
Without getting into an in-depty discussion of why we need more native plants in our gardens – front and back – I am a firm believer that where and how native plants grow make a world of difference to how they are perceived.
In the woodland and other natural areas, Mother Nature does the planting. Somehow, she seems to know how and where to grow these plants so that they fit in perfectly in most cases and make us stop in our tracks and marvel at their perfection.
Click on the links for my earlier post entitled “A Walk in the Woods” and the accompanying Photo Gallery.
Mayapple in Bloom
Most passersby will never notice the lovely white flower beneath the large, attractive leaves of the Mayapples that spread across the woodland floor, but if you lift one of the leaves you just might see the large white flowers that eventually become the “apple” later in summer. The seeds of the “apple” seed pods are eventually planted by ants and other fauna.
She doesn’t worry about planting in ones, threes or fives. Odd numbers are not in her vocabulary. She plants as many as needed, where they grow best. The fact their placement almost always feels right might be coincidence, or meticulous planning, but we all know it’s really about what comes natural and what really works in that world.
During my walks in the woods, I couldn’t help but notice the familiar and unfamiliar plants that emerged with the coming of spring.
Now, I am no expert on native plants, nor do I believe that there is only room for natives in a garden setting. We definitely need more natives in are gardens, but there are aesthetic and other legitimate reasons for adding non-natives to our garden beds.
A single trillium growing among fallen logs and last year's fallen leaves. I gentle reminder to leave your leaves for the beneficial insects and wildflowers.
In the forest, however, non-natives become more controversial, especially those plants that leave our gardens and spread aggressively into the forest. Buckthorn, wild garlic and purple loosestrife are just three non-native species that threaten our woodlands in Northeastern United States and Southwestern Ontario. There are too many more to list – Lilly of the valley and ditch Lillies (those ubiquitous orange day Lillies that seem to have place in every garden) just to name a few.
Our woodland native plants need protection, but in the meantime, we can enjoy them in their natural environments provided we know when and where to look. Once we find them, we can take note of how and where they are happily growing, and ask ourselves why they are growing so successfully in that particular part of the forest or woodland clearing.
click on the link for my earlier post on why we need to plant more natives in our gardens.
By asking ourselves that question, we can locate them in our own gardens with greater success.
Lesson 1: Mother Nature never plants trilliums where she thinks they will look best or seen by the majority of visitors to the woodland. Instead, they appear where they will grow best – in the right light, in deep, rich forest soil formed over years of leaves falling to the ground and decaying year after year. They are not growing in that sandy soil or heavy clay, many of us try to force our trilliums to grow in our gardens.
A cluster of Wake Robin trilliums photographed from above to show their nodding habit and the habitat where they grow. Notice the abundance of fallen leaves and native white pine needles.
What native Trilliums in the woodland can teach us
A wonderful discovery in the woodland. Not far off a secondary path a grop of red trilliums or wake robins warmed up the woodland floor.
Trilliums are a great example of our spring ephemerals. They begin to emerge when the leaves have yet to fill the tree canopy. Without the leaves shading the ground, the sun’s rays reach down deep into the forest floor warming it quickly and giving a kick start to the winter-dormant plants.
By the time the leaves are emerging from the upper canopy, our trilliums are beginning to appear. First in sunnier west-facing areas that get sufficient morning and afternoon light, followed by other areas on the forest floor.
Click on the link for more on growing trilliums in our woodland gardens.
Mother Nature looks for ideal conditions and then lets the trilliums go to work building drifts and, at times, massive carpets of Ontario’s official wildflower.
A wake robin nodding in their typical style of growth.
On my woodland walks this spring, I have watched the trilliums emerge in various parts of the forest, mostly in small groups rather than large drifts, and certainly not in any large carpets that I have witnessed elsewhere.
Along the way main pathway where hundreds of people walk, run and ride their bikes, the trilliums survive and put on a nice show. Some take up perfect spots overlooking the clear creek that runs alongside the path. These are particularly pretty with the stream flowing past them and make for potentially lovely photos.
But, it’s off the main path over the many surrounding hills where I find the largest number of trilliums and certainly the most photographically pleasing compositions. Here, they are more or less undisturbed. The leaf cover is deeper, the fallen trees are decaying more naturally without much interference from humans and the plants are able to spread their seed more efficiently.
On one recent walk along the main path, I noticed a much smaller path going almost straight up vertically. With my trusted, and highly recommended walking sticks, (Amazon Link) I climbed the steep hill, only to be greeted by a lovely woodland scene full of fallen tree stumps in various levels of decay, wood ferns and trilliums – most in small groups, but others growing singularly.
From my vantage point on the other side of the hill, I could hear people walking by (talking loudly of course even in the quiet of the woodland), but I was in another world entirely.
I imagined creating a similar “secret garden” in a quiet area in our woodland garden. It could never match this magical discovery, but maybe I could capture the spirit of the place.
Native Foam flower (Tiarella) blooms alongside trilliums and other native wildflowers.
Lesson 2: Look to capture special places you discover in the woodland in your own garden. You will likely never replicate the exact feeling, but you can capture the spirit of those places. A fallen log left to become moss-covered, a pocket of deep rich humusy soil where you can successfully grow trilliums and wood ferns. Add a natural seating area where you can escape the noisy world around you. Maybe add a natural stone basin to encourage wildlife to visit your secret place.
Woodland scene
How easy would it be to duplicate this first scene in your woodland garden? The cut tree is the result of the local conservation authority maintaining the forest to some degree after fallen trees block walking paths.
In another, much more distant area of the woodland, I come across a grouping of Wake Robin hidden in a quiet area far from the groups of walkers, families with children out for a stroll and bike riders ripping up the forest floor with their knobby tires.
I’m guessing these, more rare, grouping of maroon trilliums have escaped the eye of people who think the wildflowers are there for only their enjoyment and walk off with either an entire plant or just the flowers, hoping to get them home in time to pop them in a vase.
Or maybe, it’s just ideal conditions that brought them there.
As spring opened its arms to more and more wildlfowers, from the large drifts of Mayapple and skunk cabbage (covered in more depth in my first post A Walk in the Woods), the emergence of large drifts and smaller clumps of Forget-Me-Nots began lighting up the forest floor.
The blue mistiness of a blanket of Forget Me Nots surround a large tree just off the path in the woodland.
Forget Me Nots: Native or non-native?
A ray of sunshine catches a clump of Forget Me Nots along a main path. Being out late in the day allows us to capture special moments like these.
I was always of the understanding that Forget-me-nots were an introduced species that naturalized in our woodlands, but I have learned that, in fact, there is a species of native Forget-Me-Nots in the United States and Canada. That’s good news because they are certainly in abundance in the woodland around my home as well as in our garden.
The species native North America including Ontario, Canada is Myosotis Macrosperma, also known as the large-seed forget-me-not. It is in the borage family (Boraginaceae) and found in a variety of natural habitats, including areas of bottomland forests, mesic forests and prairies. Like most native woodland plans it likes nutrient-rich soils, but can be found growing in less than ideal soils including pastures and fallow fields.
Myosotis macrosperma is a spring blooming herbaceous annual that produces a cyme of white flowers. Myosotis macrosperma can be distinguished from the non-natives by its longer inflorescence nodes, larger and more deciduous calyx, and larger mericarps
While the common forget-me-not (Myosotis sylvatica) is not native to North America and is considered an invasive species, it has naturalized in various regions.
I admit a soft sot for these lovely little flowers and enjoy photographing them whether they are the native or non-native variety. They are not around for long and are certainly willing self-seeders.
Lesson 3: Unless you want to be inundated with an abundance of Forget-me-nots in your spring garden, think twice about introducing them to your garden. On the other hand, if you like the blue carpet of these early spring bloomers, feel free to let them spread through areas of the garden and experience the joy of the misty blue carpet every spring. In an area of our garden, the Forget-Me-Nots are happily spreading and allowed me to capture the image of the spring fawn (above).
Many of the images in this post and other posts from a “Walk in the Woods” were post processed with Luminar Neo software. If you are looking for an inexpensive, but comprehensive editing program for beginners, check out Luminar Neo’s wide ranging tools to take your editing to new heights. Check the bottom of page for a 10 per cent discount code.
A river of Marsh Marigolds is a stunning sight to come upon on a misty morning in early May. Below, a single bloom shows how beautiful they are in close up.
A river of of Marsh Marigold
I stumbled across a river of marsh-marigold (Caltha palustris) also known as kingcup one misty morning on a path a little out of the way of the main walking path, but certainly in an area regularly visited by the many who walk the conservation area trails.
A single marsh marigold bloom from the river that blanketed an area in an open, marshy area of the woodland.
I photographed the incredible scene from every angle I could imagine to ensure I could do it justice. In other areas, smaller clumps of the joyful sunny flowers graced the woodland wetlands.
Marsh Marigolds, is a small to medium sized herbaceous perennial and member of the buttercup family. As its name implies, they are native to marshes, fens, ditches and wet woodlands throughout the northern hemisphere. These lovely plants flower between April and August depending on location. For more details, use this link to read Wikipedia’s extensive description.
Wikipedia includes this description of the flowers or (inflorescence): “The common marsh-marigold mostly has several flowering stems of up to 80 cm (31 in) long, carrying mostly several seated leaflike stipules, although lower ones may be on a short petiole; and between four and six (but occasionally as few as one or as many as 25) flowers. The flowers are approximately 4 cm (1+1⁄2 in) but range between 2–5.5 cm (3⁄4–2+1⁄4 in) in diameter.”
How is that for a mouthful?
Lesson 4: All I know is that these native wildflowers thrive in the local wetlands. Unfortunately, I don’t have a natural or man-made pond in our garden, but if I did, these would be a must-have. Not only do they light up the area with an abundance of golden flowers, they provide pollinators with an early-spring source of food. A win-win for our gardens.
Wild geranium or cranesbill
A wild geranium shows off its lovely mauve flower. These are an important early source of nectar and pollen for a host of insects.
Wild Geranium making their presence felt
Most woodland gardeners have at least one wild geranium (cranesbill) in their gardens. Whether it’s the native plant or one of the many “nativars” that have invaded most nurseries, these hardy, low-growing ground covers work as well in the natural woodlands as they do in our gardens.
Click on the link for my full story on using wild geraniums as a ground cover.
As I write this post in late May, the Wild Geranium are just starting to flower both in the natural woodland and in our garden. The mauve flowers are always a welcoming sight growing among the ferns and adding colour to the forest floor. Check out my earlier post on growing wild geranium as a ground cover in the woodland garden.
Wild strawberry make an appearance in late May. The flowers will eventually turn into a wild strawberry fruit that willed woodland fauna.
As May turns to June and the woodland matures from spring to early summer wildflowers, ferns, mayapple, sedges, Jack-in-the-pulpits and other primarily foliage plants begin to take over from the ephemerals in the woodland, where they go about their business of shading the forest floor.
I’ll keep visiting my woodland, exploring and discovering more native flowers, plants, shrubs and trees as spring turns to summer. Here are just a few more I came across during my Walks in the woodland.
Jack in the Pulpit
Areas of the woodland support numerous Jack in the Pulpits, which easily go unnoticed on the greening forest floor..
A native Redbud tree has found its roots in a dense part of the woodland along a stream.
A serviceberry tree enjoys a ray of late evening sunshine that lights up it myriad spring flowers. In summer, the tree will be visited by woodland birds and mammals looking to get a taste of its sweet red fruit.
Concluding thoughts on a walk in the woods
Walking in my local woodlands this spring and exploring the flora and fauna that grows naturally there has been an eye-opening experience. Not only have I watched the forest come to life, but I have witnessed the change from week-to-week, day-to-day.
It’s been an inspiring couple of months as the regular visits allow me to become more intimate with the landscape, flora and fauna. Our woodland is actually part of the Hamilton Conservation Authority and is located primarily in a deep, rather hilly ravine.
The Dogtooth violet photographed from above to show habitat and bring out its interesting star shape. The image was processed with Luminar Neo where it was given a soft glow often effect to bring out a dreamy look. For more on Luminar Neo, see links below.
In the past, a very bad hip would never have allowed me to hike the area, especially considering the extreme variations in topography. The only reason I am able to hike these woodlands as extensively as I have is with the use of Nordic hiking sticks. Whether you are young or old, in perfect health or struggling to keep up, Nordic hiking sticks should be an important part of your journey into the woods.
I have used hiking sticks for close to a year and would not be without them on any hike into the woods.
If you live near to a woodland – and most of us do – take time to experience it, explore it and discover the hidden treasures nature provides us if we make the effort.
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