arghman
New member
- Joined
- Sep 1, 2004
- Messages
- 1,352
- Reaction score
- 153
I went on a hike yesterday w/ Amicus to the southeastern slopes of Mt Washington. Autumn comes early at 5000'; this is a good time to see some nice fall color before the leaf-peepers arrive. Bye-bye, chlorophyll:
alpine bearberry (Arctostaphylos alpina) and diapensia (Diapensia lapponica). I am assuming the grass/sedge is deer's hair sedge (Scirpus caespitosus) but am not sure. The bearberry is easier to recognize this time of year & if you see some of it, take note where & call NH Natural Heritage Bureau (or Maine Natural Areas Program if you are on Katahdin) to find out if it's somewhere they don't have in their database. It occurs in the US only in Alaska, the Presidential Range, and on Katahdin; I'm not sure how abundant it is on Katahdin but in the Presis it's rather uncommon & occurs in small patches, on windswept open ground with diapensia and bog bilberry. A week earlier & it would have been a very nice patchwork of green and red, and much easier to find as it's usually the first species to turn color -- but now the other heaths, e.g. bog bilberry, have also begun to turn the same color of burgundy and are much more common.
mountain ash (Sorbus sp. but don't ask me which one)
mountain heath (Phyllodoce caerulea), another very uncommon plant on the state tracking lists
3-toothed cinquefoil (Sibbaldiopsis tridentata), w/ mountain cranberry (Vaccinium vitis-idaea) on the right, and a number of lichens, of which only one that I can identify (the yellow-green map-lichen)
Mountain avens (Geum peckii).
Deer's-hair sedge (I think) in a gusty wind, with Eisenhower in the background.
Rather chilly above Boott Spur, w/ temps probably in the low 50s & 30-40mph winds. Cloud ceiling was probably 7000-8000' earlier on (Mt W buildings were visible for much of the day) but came down to the 5000-5500' level later in the day. Below 4500' the wind was much less severe & temps warmer. We were fortunate to do this trip yesterday before the remnants of Ernesto came through.... My glove liners, which would have been nice to have, and which I always have in my pack, were missing & when I got back home I found them sitting on my kitchen floor where I had been scrambling to get my gear together in the early morning. Darn it, I don't know why I took them out.
We ran into a group of about 8 or 10 Asian-Americans in their teens and twenties, with T-shirts on, heading up the Glen Boulder trail below Slide Peak at about 3pm as we were descending; we asked where they were going & they said "the top", which a 2nd question confirmed as Mt Washington
We warned them about the weather. I hope they had the good sense to turn around not too much later. When we got below the Glen Boulder there was a young woman who asked if we'd seen them; she was waiting there with some of their backpacks.
A good day to be above treeline.
alpine bearberry (Arctostaphylos alpina) and diapensia (Diapensia lapponica). I am assuming the grass/sedge is deer's hair sedge (Scirpus caespitosus) but am not sure. The bearberry is easier to recognize this time of year & if you see some of it, take note where & call NH Natural Heritage Bureau (or Maine Natural Areas Program if you are on Katahdin) to find out if it's somewhere they don't have in their database. It occurs in the US only in Alaska, the Presidential Range, and on Katahdin; I'm not sure how abundant it is on Katahdin but in the Presis it's rather uncommon & occurs in small patches, on windswept open ground with diapensia and bog bilberry. A week earlier & it would have been a very nice patchwork of green and red, and much easier to find as it's usually the first species to turn color -- but now the other heaths, e.g. bog bilberry, have also begun to turn the same color of burgundy and are much more common.
mountain ash (Sorbus sp. but don't ask me which one)
mountain heath (Phyllodoce caerulea), another very uncommon plant on the state tracking lists
3-toothed cinquefoil (Sibbaldiopsis tridentata), w/ mountain cranberry (Vaccinium vitis-idaea) on the right, and a number of lichens, of which only one that I can identify (the yellow-green map-lichen)
Mountain avens (Geum peckii).
Deer's-hair sedge (I think) in a gusty wind, with Eisenhower in the background.
Rather chilly above Boott Spur, w/ temps probably in the low 50s & 30-40mph winds. Cloud ceiling was probably 7000-8000' earlier on (Mt W buildings were visible for much of the day) but came down to the 5000-5500' level later in the day. Below 4500' the wind was much less severe & temps warmer. We were fortunate to do this trip yesterday before the remnants of Ernesto came through.... My glove liners, which would have been nice to have, and which I always have in my pack, were missing & when I got back home I found them sitting on my kitchen floor where I had been scrambling to get my gear together in the early morning. Darn it, I don't know why I took them out.
We ran into a group of about 8 or 10 Asian-Americans in their teens and twenties, with T-shirts on, heading up the Glen Boulder trail below Slide Peak at about 3pm as we were descending; we asked where they were going & they said "the top", which a 2nd question confirmed as Mt Washington
We warned them about the weather. I hope they had the good sense to turn around not too much later. When we got below the Glen Boulder there was a young woman who asked if we'd seen them; she was waiting there with some of their backpacks. A good day to be above treeline.
