A NOVEMBER WALK CAN REVEAL MUCH   

Thursday, December 02, 2010

There were still lots of ferns peeking through the forest duff, despite it being late November. Collectively, these were evergreen ferns – masses of wood ferns, and probably Christmas ferns, had we probed a bit more. They contrasted sharply to the now leafless trees along the Jobes’ Woods Trail, here at Presqu’ile.

So many miracles of nature reveal themselves at this time of the year when our eyes aren’t overwhelmed by heavy foliage, wildflowers and critters moving about. Several decomposing logs we came upon hosted small tree seedlings, one such log an absolute colonnade of seedlings. It’s a lesson in the importance of fallen trees, and how life continues after death, these fallen trees acting as nurse logs for those seeds that luckily choose to land here. There are nutrients here, and moisture, and as the log decomposes, the seedlings now exploit this newly opened, sunny patch in the forest, on a raised bed as it were, out of reach of competitors on the forest floor.

As the seedlings continue to grow, their needs become greater and it is now time for those roots to start seeking out additional nourishment. And it is now when these seedlings take on a form that we have all seen on our walks – stilt trees, perfectly balanced on the nurse log, long roots extending on either side of the log to reach and penetrate the earth below.  We have seen these stilt trees before in Algonquin Park, some of them even growing over large moss covered erratics where sufficient nutrients initially were available to get the seedling started. Here in the moist forest at Jobes’ Woods, the process is accelerated as the logs succumb much faster to the low lying conditions, the nurse log eventually decaying to the point where it loses its definition. Finally, the nurse log disappears completely, leaving the new tree a bizarre mass of twisted roots as it attempts to re-establish itself on the forest floor.

Trees and other plants have devised ingenious ways of coping with the thick mat of forest litter. We were shown one – the seeds of ashes. The seeds are cleverly pointed like daggers, aerodynamically evolved to spiral straight to the forest floor, and upon landing, making a commendable attempt at penetrating the thick forest floor where they can germinate and begin their life. Some make it, but most probably don’t, but enough do. We came upon three species on our walk – the more commonly encountered white ash, and black ash in the wetter areas of the forest. There was also red ash in a bit of clearing that had been an agricultural field at one time. We were reminded to enjoy these ashes while we could as once the emerald ash borer arrives, the future of all ashes will be uncertain.

There were other suggestions that this spot once had been farmed.  It was subtle, and not possible to see during the foliage of summer. On a slight hummock that the trail followed, one could see among the trees, a thickening of mature trees where a fence probably had once been. You needed to view it from the right angle. One of the chief glories of walking the same trail repeatedly, as I have been doing since the mid 1960s, is the discovery of new things. And this was clearly new to me, until pointed out by our leader.

Although our walk produced no wildlife, there were still living things to be seen, if we kept our eyes open. A glob of white on a tree transformed itself into a fungus – bear’s head tooth fungus, we were told. It is a wood rotting species, another example of nature at work in breaking down dead and dying trees. We found another, this one called hemlock varnish shelf, common only to hemlocks. Our leader was able to identify the rotting log in advanced stage of decay, by the presence of this fungal species alone.

There are so many things to see and understand on a walk like this. Yet, I am sure most who walk that trail fail to see beyond the trees and the boardwalk ahead of them. Doubtless they pass right by the diminutive striped maples without understanding their significance here at Jobes’ Woods, or even see the oversized leaves these slender trees display during the peak growing season. They miss the salamanders under the logs and the dozing mourning cloak butterfly behind the strip of loose bark, and the wispy remains of fall webworm webs.  But are we, as hike leaders, infallible? I think not, as I have missed the antique wooden sap spigot still embedded in one of the maple trees, despite leading interpretive hikes past it for more than 40 years.

At the end of the day though, should we worry?  The thrill of any interpretive hike is learning new things along the way, and in seeing the transformations that have taken place over the years. Certainly the agricultural field was far more open when I started offering hikes there in the 1960s, and the rows of planted conifers toward the end of the trail are now mature trees and tower some distance above me. And for the casual walkers on this same trail? They will miss much the first few times, instead just enjoying the experience. And the rest of it? Well it will come later.