April 2013 Hepatica Hill, Harbinger of Spring

April 08, 2013  It started as a dark, cloudy day, we decided to go to Hepatica Hill in Allegan County, about 40 miles south of where I live.  We discovered Hepatica Hill, a south facing hill along the Kalamazoo River, from a photographer /blogger, Mark Cassino.  My sister, Marie and I have several favorite places to look for wildflowers and we get pretty excited this time of year.

The thing that stands out for me, at Hepatica Hill, is that everything is cold, gray, and wet, with snow still in ditches and on some trails, but yet, there are these beautiful hepatica blooming.  All the browns and grays, then a beautiful wildflower just growing, fighting the odds, and drabness all around it!
Of course, it is great later on in the year, when there are many, different wildflowers all around but hepatica are some of the first and they are so soft and sweet.

Marie found this cool rock.

                                   At the bottom of Hepatica Hill

Kalamazoo River at Hepatica Hill

We made a very quick stop at our Happy Boots Corner in Allegan County.  I found some Marsh Marigolds struggling to bloom. 

Marsh Marigold buds

There was a steady rain while we were at Hepatica Hill, even with our rain gear we were getting wet so we hopped back in the warm car and checked out some bridges in Allegan County. 

We were driving through Casco Township and came upon Casco Township Nature Preserve.

We passed through a couple cemeteries.

  

  

We drove along the lake shore and stopped in at 121st Avenue road end, a beach along Lake Michigan and Plummerville Creek.               

 Lake Michigan at 121st Ave road end.

    Plummerville Creek flowing into Lake Michigan

But that wasn't the end of our day, we ended up, after still more rain, at the Herrick District Library in Holland, Michigan.  We looked at all the wildflower books, noting the fact that we either own them or have had them on loan from the library.  Then we looked through the Michigan section of the library. 

I found a small photo journal of Casco Township, the township we had just been driving through, and found it very interesting. 

At last it was time to go home, we did have a fun filled day!

Before Marie left to go to her house, I thought we should check my hepatica growing here in my woods, it isn't blooming yet.  Then we checked another area where I had transplanted a few wildflowers that we came across last year growing on the edge of a dirt road, right in harm's way.

There in this small patch was one tiny Habinger of Spring blooming!  I have never seen this plant here in our woods so it was a treat to find it blooming.  It doesn't look like much until you take a close look. 

                      My very own Harbinger of Spring   

 Erigenia bulbosa, also known as harbinger of spring or pepper and salt, is a perennial plant in the carrot family (Apiaceae). E. bulbosa is the only species in the genus Erigenia (Nutt.). This plant is known as harbinger of spring because it is one of the earliest blooming native wildflowers of rich forests in the mid-latitude United States.        

Early Spring at Hepatica Hill

Find a sunny south facing slope, in April, somewhere near the Kalamazoo River in Allegan County, Michigan.  Then look closely at the brown leaves, gray twigs, black dirt.  You might just find Hepatica blooming!

Do you see them?

Round-Lobed Hepatica

 Round-Lobed Hepatica buds.

These wildflowers were the high point of our adventure but there was so much more.
First we stopped in Hamilton at the trestle bridge and saw the falls.

Down the road to Happy Boots Corner!  Nice wet woods!

                                             Skunk Cabbage

We walked far to the west coming to Sand Creek.  Along the way we found many interesting things.







Sand Creek, Allegan County, Michigan

Marsh Marigold buds, in a week this will blossom into big beautiful yellow flowers! 

I don't know what this plant is, a moss, liverwort, or something else.  It was quite small.  But it was green in a brown woods so we noticed it. 

And we found rocks.  Big rocks, and they looked different from each other.  This one was gray and white with a bit of pink.

The next one looked totally different, with a flat bottom and round top.

We found wood with trails etched in them, and according to Marie, "That's the S-shaped trails of the Emerald Ash Borer which only eats the inner bark of Ash trees!" 

For a few years we have been noticing trees with the bark damage and wondered what it could be. Here are two examples below.

Damage resulting from woodpeckers, searching for a meal on an emerald ash borer infested tree.  "Woodpecker flecking"

We saw these neat stumps left in a pile...

So much to see!



Then on the opposite bank of Sand Creek I saw liverwort!  Well the creek was just a bit too deep and a bit too wide to cross, so we went back to the snowmobile bridge and crossed there. 

There the creek bank was full of my favorite liverwort.

Later Marie and I did cross the creek on a log but no pictures of that...no pictures.  I took pictures as Marie crossed but no I shouldn't post them.

While we were at Hepatica Hill (named by Mark Cassino) we walked all the way to where Bear Creek meets the Kalamazoo River.  It was a couple miles there and back, and it was a great spring day for a walk.  Like I said earlier, lots of gray and brown, and even some snow on the ground, but as we walked we saw some color flitting about?  It landed maybe 20 feet from us. I zoomed in on it with the camera, trying hard to hold still, and find that bit of orange.

Can you find the butterfly in the picture below?

There it is, circled in black.

It was beautiful, but we couldn't get closer.

 It was not easy to find this Eastern Comma - Polygonia comma  butterfly to get his photo.  We also saw our first Mourning Cloak butterfly of the year.  And a pretty Red Maple tree with flowers.





Looking down at the Kalamazoo River.  So we walked maybe 4-5 miles on this lovely spring day.  It was 37 degrees when we started out in the morning and 8 hours later the temperature was 21 degrees warmer. 

What a great way to spend a day.