Last of the Spring Field Trips at Mt. Pleasant

It’s about time for the school year to end – even with the elongation due to snow days last winter. The last of the spring field trips scheduled for the Howard County Conservancy’s Mt Pleasant Farm happened this past week. I took a few pictures before the last few hikes. Many of the formal plantings are blooming: peonies,

Flags, and

Sweet bay.

The gingko is shading the picnic area.

On one hike there was a flock of gold finch in the meadow….and an indigo bunting.

I took pictures of the milkweed plants in the meadow a few days later; they’re getting ready to bloom.

A little further down the path -  I spotted the first monarch I’ve seen this season. Is this one that flew from Mexico or released by the school children that are raised monarchs in their classroom? Maybe it doesn’t matter – because Mt Pleasant has milkweed for the butterfly to lay its eggs and for the Monarch caterpillars to eat.

Monjoy Barn gets a little shade in the mornings but by the time I came back with my hiking group it was in full sun.

The children enjoy seeing the orchard with the still-small apples (and pears too). In the fall, the fruit will be the size they see in the grocery store.

The tulip poplar is mostly done with flowering and the seed pods are beginning to form.

The trees around the farm house are in full summer green. Time for “school’s out for the summer.”

Mt. Pleasant in May 2016

I volunteered for several field trips in May at the Howard Country Conservancy’s Mt. Pleasant Farm – but only managed to take pictures the morning I spent with some middles schoolers engaged in ‘service learning’ which translates to cutting or pulling invasive species. It was a cool, cloudy day like much of our May has been. The Honors Garden gate was open as I walked by – the fountain was on and the garden looked well-tended.

I noticed the old pump – now disconnected but still in its originally location.

The flower pot people were dressed in spring finery.

The wagon shed has a display explaining tree rings but I’ve also become quite familiar with the space since it is ‘cover’ when the day as become rainy – a frequent occurrence this field trip season.

And then this odd gall in a cedar. I did a quick search for it when a got home. It looks like a cedar apple rust gall.

By the time I took these few pictures it was time to get focused on the business for the morning – the wheelbarrows for each group were full of tools,

the left glove and right glove bins were positioned. I got the tutorial on recognizing the plants we were to remove. And then the buses arrived!

We worked for a couple of hours. Honey suckle and wine berry were the most dominate in the area my group was assigned. We cut and unwrapped honey suckle from a small tree – saving it from being strangled and suffocated by the vine. Everyone worked on cutting wine berry to the ground and trying not to grip it to tightly since the fine tips of the thorns sometimes penetrated the gloves. The pile of culled invasives was pretty high when we finished and the students went off to have their picnic lunch – a job well done.

Skunk Cabbage

Skunk cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus) is some of the earliest ‘green’ sprouting from the cold ground in spring around here. I start looking for it in March. There wasn’t any up at Brookside Gardens in the first week of the month. By March 16, they were making an appearance at the Howard County Conservancy’s Mt. Pleasant Farm.

The leaves will be large and turning the previously brown leaf mulch bank into a vibrant green very quickly. Skunk cabbage are a welcome color change and a sure sign of spring (but stay far enough away from them to not smell them)!