EMERALD ASH BORER REPORTEDLY FOUND IN DULUTH, MINNESOTA

SICKLY MOUNTAIN ASH...

...WOODPECKER DAMAGE...

...FALL BERRIES

A SPECTACULAR SMOKE TREE

Monday,  8:30 AM.  68 degrees F, wind variable, light with occasional gusts.  The sky is darkly overcast.  The humidity is falling, not at 29.92.  The humidity is 80%.  It looks and feels like rain, which we need.

   The weekend was "all summer"...warm, sunny, relaxing after out very busy schedule. We did nothing except whatever we wanted to do at the moment for two whole days. 

   I don't know the details as yet, but I have heard that the emerald ash borer, EAB, has been discovered in Duluth, Minnesota, just sixty miles to our west.  This is ominous news for northern Wisconsin and it looks like an invasion is imminent.  If this is the case, there will be enormous damage to our forests, particularly in wet habitats.

   A few blogs ago I mentioned the family of woodpecker fledglings that had taken up residence in the mountain ash tree on the south side of the house and were pecking at the soft bark of its trunk and branches.  I believe they have girdled the tree so badly that it will never fully recover and will have to be taken down next year.  I have seen this happen before, but these guys were really caught in the act.  Common knowledge has it that they are pecking at grubs under the bark and this is often the case, but sometimes they peck at soft barked trees for seemingly no other reason than that they like to do it, and they can actually kill a given tree that they have taken a fancy to.

   Driving in the orchard country yesterday we noticed these yellow pond lilies, AKA spatter-dock, Nuphar advena, growing in an irrigation pond.  Our native water lilies, Nymphaea alba, have mostly white petals, and the flowers float flat on the water.  The yellow Nuphar flowers are cup shaped and rise above the water on a long stem; the leaves also float.  Both species are in the water lily family, the Nymphaceae.  There is a third species of water lily-like aquatic plant native to southern wisconsin, Nelumbo lutea, the water chinquapin or wonkapin.  It's yellow flowers are also held above the water on a tall stem, but are otherwise similar in appearance to those of Nymphaea. It appears in southern Wisconsin along the southern reaches of the Wisconsin River.  N. nucifera, the oriental sacred lotus, is an occasional escapee in the same regions. It has pink flowers.  I do not recall ever seeing it in the wild.  The leaves of the last two species are often held up out of the water by long stems, rather than float, like water-lily leaves.

   the spectacular smoke tree pictured above is on the corner of Hwy. 13 and Rice Ave. in Bayfield.  It is worth a look if you are in town.