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| Other Good
Wildflower Sites in the Mid-Atlantic Region |
| Other good
wildflower sites in the Mid-Atlantic
region include the New Jersey Pine Barrens; Battle
Creek Cypress Swamp; serpentine barrens
in Pennsylvania (Chrome
Barrens, Goat
Hill, and Nottingham)
and Maryland (Soldier's
Delight); and G.
Richard Thompson Wildlife Management Area,
Linden, VA. What comes to mind when someone
mentions New Jersey—an endless series
of highway exits; the only open space is
in the large malls; the smell between Newark
Airport and the Meadowlands; a place where
people watch a football team from New York
play in a landfill next to a turnpike. Did
you know that the largest undeveloped area
between Boston and Atlanta, the Pine
Barrens, is found in New Jersey? The
Pine Barrens has 850 species of plants including 173
state-endangered, threatened, or rare species.
Some of these species are critically imperiled
or imperiled globally (e.g., Knieskern's
beaked rush, Rhynchospora
knieskernii; sensitive joint-vetch,
Aeschynomene
virginica; bog asphodel, Narthecium
americanum). Many plants reach their
geographic limits in the Pine Barrens including
109 southern (e.g., pixiemoss, Pyxidanthera brevifolia; turkeybeard, Xerophyllum asphodeloides and 14
northern species (e.g., broom crowberry, Corema conradii). There are 15,000 acres of
Pygmy
Forest less than 5 feet tall consisting
of mature pitch pine (Pinus rigida), black-jack
oak (Quercus marilandica), and, less commonly,
scrub oak (Quercus ilicifolia). In mid-June
at Webb's
Mill Bog, you may see three species
of orchids in bloom (dragon's mouth, Arethusa
bulbosa; grass pink, Calopogon tuberosus;
rose pogonia, Pogonia ophioglossoides),
curly grass fern (Schizaea pusilla), bog
asphodel (Narthecium americanum), and carnivorous plants
(three species of sundews: Drosera intermedia,
D. rotundifolia, D. filiformis; four species
of bladderworts: Utricularia cornuta, U.
gibba, U. inflata, U. subulata; pitcher
plant: Sarracenia purpurea). One of the
northernmost stands of bald cypress in the
U.S. is an hour drive south of Washington,
DC at Battle
Creek Cypress Swamp. The State
Line Serpentine Barrens are the largest
serpentine barrens in the eastern United
States and host rare plant species like
the serpentine aster (Symphyotrichum
depauperatum), round-leaved fame-flower
(Talinum teretifolium), and fringed gentian (Gentianopsis
crinita) that are adapted to heat, fire,
and toxic, low-nutrient soils. In early
May, millions of white trillium (Trillium
grandiflorum) are in flower at the Thompson
Wildlife Management Area, the largest
colony in the United States. |
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