Pine, hemlock, cedar, and oak at Peebles Island on the last day of 2011

Today when I arrived at Peebles Island, I saw that there was a little water on the floodplain to the west of the bridge.  Geese and gulls were browsing there.

When I walked into the forest, it seemed very quiet, though there was some birdsong.  I did not know what kind of birds I heard, but they seemed different from the birds I usually hear around home and work.  The birds I usually hear around home and work include sparrows, robins, starlings, and crows.  Later in the walk, I spotted chickadees and nuthatches. I may have seen a flock of juncos as well.  I could not get a close enough look to tell what they were.  They were among trees on the cliff.

In the forest, I saw the usual black birch, oak, etc.  Having just seen pines when I was in Connecticut and New Hampshire the past week, I was struck by the absence of pines.  However I did in time come to a grove of white pines.  I looked around to see what made this spot different, why would pines grow here and not in other places? What I noticed was that it was a low-lying area.  However, there are other low-lying areas on the island where pines do not grow.

Besides the pines, the evergreens I see at Peebles Island are hemlocks and what may be Atlantic white cedar (I have trouble distinguishing the "cedars.")  The hemlocks mostly grow on the side of the cliff.  There's an area where there are a lot of them on the cliff.  In that area, there are also a few over on the inland side of the path.

Being on the side of the cliff affects the shape of this hemlock:

Because the trees have mostly lost their leaves, it is harder to identify them. However, the oaks can be identified by the leaves that still cling to them. After identifying them by their leaves, I studied their bark and buds, to see if I could learn to recognize oaks that way as well.

Here is the bark of two small oaks near the cliffside. I think the first is red oak and the second is white oak.

The bark on these small trees looks quite different from the bark of the big old oaks.

The oaks had clusters of small red buds at the ends of their twigs.

I spent some time examining a small white oak that had many leaves still on it. I noticed that there were buds at the base of each leaf. I concluded therefore that in the places where there were buds but no leaves, there probably had been leaves which had fallen off. I examined the buds that were not adjacent to leaves, and found the leaf scars behind them.

The forest also includes trees which I think are chestnut oaks.

Basal scar

In Reading the Forest Landscape, I read about how trees may have marks called "basal scars," places where the bark is missing.  Because of reading about it, I noticed when I saw such an injury on a tree when I was walking in Connecticut a few days ago.

According to the book, basal scars may be caused by fire or by a blow from an object such as a log or a car.

The forests of New England

For the holidays, I visited my mother in Connecticut and my father in New Hampshire.  New England is where I grew up.  Now I live not far from New England, but it seems a little different here.  The forest I saw on my trip looked more like home than the forests I see here.  The forests of home are a mix of evergreen and deciduous trees.   They are hilly, and full of boulders.  Forest floors are covered with pine needles and oak leaves.

Autumn flowers

Flowers and buds are for spring right? Then why do flowers keep blooming lately?

The magnolia buds were full on November 28.

It was also on November 28 that I noticed flowers on a tree, but when I tried to take a photo, the flowers seemed too high up to capture. On November 30, I was able to capture a photo from that tree.

In addition to the flowers that are the focus of this photo, you can kind of see that there are flowers in the upper left.  This tree is located on 14th Street, near Hutton Street.  I think it might be a cherry tree, based on the bark and the flowers.

On December 4, I saw these flowers near the JEC circle.  I don't know what kind they are.

Today, when I went outside, I saw that the forsythia bush by my apartment was blooming.

In this photo, you can also see what the forsythia buds look like.

Reds of barberry and crabapple

The campus is still warm with color, especially with the reds of barberry and crabapple.

Callery pear loses its leaves

The Callery pear was colorful while other trees had lost their leaves, but finally it too is losing its leaves.

The wonders of December

When I lived in Pennsylvania, I did not like summer because it was too hot.  Now that I live in Troy, summer is my favorite season, because it's the only season when the temperature is warm enough to be comfortable.  Since coming to Troy, I have dreaded the coming of winter, when it is dark, cold, bare, and gray. But starting last winter, I started to see more beauty in winter.  It's not winter yet, but the trees are bare.  Walking at Peebles Island today, I found that even with bare trees, nature is filled with beauty.

Today I studied the bark of the cottonwood.

I was enchanted by the shoreline.  It reminded me of the mountains I visited in Venezuela, with the water at the shoreline looking like the clouds in the mountains.

The water of the river has usually been completely opaque, but this time, it had more clarity to it, allowing me to see to the earth below.

The absence of the leaves allowed me to see the sunset through the trees.

It also allowed me to see a forest pool.

I drew closer to the pool, and found some beautiful reflections in it.

When are reflections most striking? It seems to me that it would be at dusk and dawn.  I wonder if it also make a difference that it is getting closer to winter solstice.

As I left the forest pool and returned to the path, I walked up a moss-covered hill.

Bob's tree in November

Bob's tree has no leaves at this time of year, but it has plenty of fruits.

Colors of late November

It's the end of November, and campus is still colorful.

The Peebles Island forest in late November

This is what the forest at Peebles Island looks like at this time of year.

Because the leaves have fallen, you can see farther through the forest. You can see the water. You can see where the paths leads. In many of the treetops, you can see clusters of leaves or twigs. These must be nests created by animals such as birds or squirrels.

Back in July, I usually saw deer when I went to Peebles Island.  Now I have not seen any deer for some time.

The forest floor is covered with oak leaves.

There are oak trees in this forest, but there are also other trees. Why do the leaves on the forest floor seem so predominantly oak? I looked closer, and I saw that there are also other leaves that are all shriveled up. I think the oak leaves are more noticeable than the leaves of other trees, because the oak leaves are not shriveled up.

There's an area in the forest where there's a lot of grass beside the trail.  Why is it grassy? Usually places don't stay grassy unless they are mowed regularly.  Do they come out to the middle of the woods and mow this place? Was there grass planted here in the past, when the island was more cultivated, and now it just stays grassy without any intervention?

Green grass

When spring comes, I notice the grass turning greener.  When does it lose its green?  It is still green now.

A stump at Peebles Island

Today at Peebles Island, I observed a stump. It had some fungi growing on it.

And also another kind of fungi.

They say you can tell the age of a tree by the rings, but I did not see rings. I saw cracks perpendicular to the way rings are supposed to go.

There was a chunk of wood that stuck out from the rest.

Mystery tree from November 9

On November 9, my attention was caught by trees near the parking garage entrance that were still bright with autumn color, when many other trees were past their peak.

They had distinctive buds

and distinctive fruit.

The leaves were pinnately veined.

How to identify this intriguing tree? The books that I got to help me identify unkown trees (What Tree is This and The Tree Identification Book) usually leave me frustrated.  What usually works is flipping through Trees of New York.  However, I could see that this was a cultivated tree, so I did not expect it to be in Trees of New York.  I expected it to be in The Sibley Guide to Trees, but that's a 400 page book.  How could I look through every page of that book until I found it?

Once I became aware of this type of tree, I realized that it was in other places I frequented (the Union, the quad between Lally and Sage, and downtown by the Atrium).

This is the one near Sage, photographed November 14:

I had four days off for Thanksgiving, so finally I looked through The Sibley Guide to Trees. I found it was not nearly as hard as I had feared.  There were some sections that were clearly not right, so I could skip those sections.  The tree that seemed to match was the Callery Pear.  It matches in this ways:

• Leaf shape.
• Leaf autumn color.
• Tree shape.
• Commonly cultivated.
• Late fall foliage.
• Fruit.  Actually, the fruit I saw on the trees was a little different from how it looked in the book, but it was the closest match compared to the fruits of other trees in the book.