I spent most of my Sunday exploring Centennial Woods, as I have a personal bias. I entered into the woods at around noon, planning to spend the rest of the day there. I really enjoy my time in there because I can really spend my time these days focusing on the smaller changes in the woods. Having viewed this forest go through all four seasons now, I truly appreciate and love everything it has to offer for me and everyone who chooses to explore it. I had traditionally used Seek as my app for nature identification, so switching apps was the only jump. The actual identification process was also a breeze, and I picked up a lovely small array of 12 observations, with a total of 12 species.
This first plant that I identified was this lovely Canada Hawkweed. I was strolling along the stream bed that is just past the first set of bird feeders, and I stumbled across a nice patch of this. This American Red Squirrel enjoyed its time examining the bird feeder in the tree adjacent to him, as a hungry and very curious chickadee explored said feeder. I found this Purplepore Bracket along the riverbed by first set of bridges that are completely outside of the forest’s canopy. This Bittercress was scattered near the Bear Crossing bridge and pond. The hungry gold finch was pecking at this feeder for almost 10 minutes before losing interest. I watched with my friend as it explored the ins and outs of the contraption. This Rough Horsetail, which I memorably call by the first part of its latin name, Equisetum, was scattered about and beginning to grow all along the inner parts of the marsh, a sign that warmer temperatures are upon us. However, it is nonnative but is mostly harmless aside from taking up habitat space in the competition of the web. This lovely Mallard was quite fearless when it walked confidently across the bridge at this pond with my friend and I also on it, minutes after this picture was taken. This Common Garter Snake was slithering along the path that is just past the pond and into the field of mixed-species saplings. I was particularly excited to find this Eastern Crayfish, as it is always a species I am on the lookout for when I come across small forested streams, ponds, and brooks. These fiddleheads of the Royal Fern Family were scattered all about Centennial Woods, sprouting up and beginning their next stage of growth. This maple bud was hanging off what had looked to be a dead tree that ended up being very much alive, however precariously perched against another tree it might’ve been. This plant striked me with interest due to how uninteresting it probably appeared to most people. I could not identify it fully as iNaturalist defined it as a Burdocks, and I was unsure what it was, and my friend was unsure as well.
