“Right plant, right place.” This mantra, good for muttering to oneself at the nursery so as not to waste money on temptations that, though beautiful, have absolutely no business being […]
NATURAL SELECTION
Bare Berries
The pictured shrub, scientifically classified as Viburnum nudum — presumably for the smoothness of its shoots — has endured many a christening. Someone more focused on its fruit than its […]
NATURAL SELECTION
The Way to Groove Me, Cherry
Prunus, the cherry genus, is second only to Quercus, the oaks, when it comes to providing essential wildlife services, as they say, to birds and insects. (Photo by Joe Beuerlein)Prunus […]
GROWING WILD
A Novel Assemblage of Species, at Home on Cape Cod’s Sandplains
Keeping oaks and pines at bay for the butterflies and birds
Not far into the Audubon sanctuary’s Bay View Trail, which skirts the shore on South Wellfleet’s bay side before making a long loop back to its starting point, a side […]
NATURAL SELECTION
Frogs and Worts
The Virginia marsh St. John’s wort is no longer placed in the Hypericum genus with the others; its pink-blooming flowers each have three orange glands and nine stamens grouped in […]
NATURAL SELECTION
Starflower Power
Though Lysimachia borealis is a diminutive plant in the understory, found in colonies that help roll out the spring carpet along with Canada mayflower and wild sarsaparilla, its beauty is […]
WALK IN THE PARK
Pitch Pines on the Path to Eastham’s Forest Primeval
New clearings and pioneer species were probably always part of our old oak forests
The idea behind Eastham’s rather grandly named 1651 Arboretum was to cultivate the sort of mature forest that the first European settlers might have encountered and, theoretically, enjoyed before subsequent […]
NATURAL SELECTION
Fringe Festival
The trail that leads down to Wellfleet’s cedar swamp, where majestic Atlantic white cedars grow from a bed of standing water, begins up on the heathland. There, the path winds […]
NATURAL SELECTION
70 Million Years Young
The fuzz-covered newborns that can be seen unrolling from their fetal positions near the cedar swamp in Wellfleet this week are the fresh fronds of cinnamon fern, Osmundastrum cinnamomeum, an […]
NATURAL SELECTION
Carex Calls for Aid
Rising (relatively) high on triangular stalks, the male flowers of Carex pensylvanica, a grass-like sedge that can be found softening the Outer Cape’s oak-pine forest floors, are jutting out their pale-yellow stamens […]
NATURAL SELECTION
Pilewort for the Peloton
Cyclists may especially appreciate the medicinal role the yellow-blooming plant growing alongside the Rail Trail in Eastham once played. Though this buttercup isn’t known these days for being anything but […]
NATURAL SELECTION
The Stink of Spring
It’s officially spring at the Eddy Sisters Community Garden in Brewster when wafts of the scent of rotting flesh begin to carry over from the property’s adjoining bog, where the […]
NATURAL SELECTION
Wishing on Neon Stars
There are two species of the New World genus Hudsonia, or false heather, on the Cape: a woolier one with fuzzy leaves and flowers that don’t have much of a […]
NATURAL SELECTION
Good for a Pain in the Apse
The smooth red-brown buds opening like hatches across from the Methodist Church in Provincetown may belong to Salix discolor, the native pussy willow, or they could belong to an introduced […]
NATURAL SELECTION
A Catkin of Another Kind
In the summer, the speckled alder, Alnus incana, hides in plain sight along the Beech Forest trail in Provincetown; its leaves look almost identical to those of Fagus grandifolia. This […]
