The Daily Bucket is a regular feature of the Backyard Science group. It is a place to note of any observations you have made of the world around you. Insects, weather, meteorites, climate, birds and/or flowers. All are worthy additions to the bucket. Please let us know what is going on around you in a comment. Include, as close as is comfortable for you, where you are located. Each note is a record that we can refer to in the future as we try to understand the patterns that are quietly unwinding around us.
My grandsons and I took a little walk in August. These are some of the pictures I took. Memories of that great day caused me to include too many photos. This is an example of alpine muskeg in Southeast Alaska.
many pictures (I tried to keep them small to reduce download times, Ctrl ++?)
At about 1600 ft elevation, the trees have opened enough to get some context, though there is a great variety of plant species, grasses are the dominant ground cover.
By 1800' the grass is loosing the competition for space. Deer lettuce and mosses along with stunted shrubs and forbes. Already the trees are showing the stress. It's a hard life in the great north woods.
A sample of the diversity of species growing here.
A flower unknown to me is about to bloom, I wanted to return just to get a pic of it in flower, honest.
One of the many small ponds had a Blue Darter(?) on a yellow waterlily leaf. There were also oarsmen, waterstriders and unidentified nymphs sharing in the feast of flying bugs.
White Bog Orchid, plantanthera dilatata
Unknown to me, pretty though
Common Butterwort, pingulica vulgaris, the leaves are insectivorous
Butterwort again, better view of the leaves.
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2500' The foot high forest, I have no idea of the actual age of these Mountain Hemlocks, tsuga mertensiana but the impression is of antiquity
A vaccinium sp. an inch high and flowering.(by the quarter) I wish it reproductive success, such persistence is admirable
A five leaved bramble, rubis peregrines,(I think, not a whole lot of evidence here) the berry is the size of a small pea. This is another example of dwarfed plants trying to cope with a heavy snow load and a very short season.
OK, what's this? It looks like the flowers evolved to receive satellite transmissions, I can't find an ID anywhere.
There were many species left undepicted, there could have been a whole diary of varieties of heather alone, next time maybe.
Hope you enjoyed some of this, what's happening in your backyard? Is summer staying late or is Autumn early? New birds or other life moving around? Let us know.