Fern Valley Northern Bog

This is not the best picture and that is not the most perfect Cornus canadensis flower of all time but it is flowering right now in the Northern Bog along the Main Trail in Fern Valley. That is something of an accomplishment. Bunchberry is a low creeping dogwood that is only listed as far south as USDA Zone 6; we are either a very high 7 (the general consensus), or a low 8 (my personal observation), and success with this plant is not common hereabouts.

We are growing it in a person made bog that we did a few years ago. To create it we excavated soil to a depth of about a foot, lined the excavation with a rubber pond liner, removed the middle of the bottom so that water could slowly drain in the event of prolonged periods of high rainfall (like this spring). Then we filled it with a mixture of sphagnum peat (both long fibered and standard horticultural) and quartz sand. We have been planting it ever since.

I am a person who goes to a lot of gardens and "bogs" were features that were quite hot for a while and may still be. This bog is working better than any of the other "created" bogs that I am aware of. We are developing a pretty good cover of Sphagnum moss, which is, of course, the predominant plant in most northern bogs, as well as the substrate in which the other plants grow. We have two cranberries, Vaccinium macrocarpon, that need to be pruned diligently lest they take over the entire bog. There are carnivores, both Sarracenia and Drosera. And there are a host of other northern species that are doing well so far: Twinflower, Labrador Tea, Rhodora, Leatherleaf, Crowberry, Aletris, Calopogon, Linnea, and, actually, a few more I am not remembering. You can't miss the bog; its abuts the left side of the main trail (by the Fern Valley sign across from the Parking Area) about 100' in from the road.

Christmas in May....Northern native plant windfall

If you are a regular visitor to Fern Valley, you have undoubtedly noticed the construction that is underway now and has been going on since last winter! The ultimate object of it all is to make as much of the trail system as we can accessible to as many people as possible. This involves resurfacing trails and adjusting level and grade. To achieve a reasonable grade in the Northern Woods section, the big bridge was raised resulting in its lengthening (to ~100'!). Two other bridges in that section were redone. The trail system is nice back there now, and the view from the newly uplifted bridge emphasizes parts of the collection that had previously not been particularly noticeable. We began to address these areas this spring by transferring propagations of plants that we already had in other areas. But wonderful plants were to arrive almost out of the blue; serendipity is a good thing.

Stefan Lura, the new Plant Records Botanist, resident rose expert (he would be the resident rose expert anywhere he went), and general plant fanatic, commissioned his parents to harvest native plants from their property in Minnesota. The bounty arrived Friday in the rain. In the picture Stefan is unpacking and rigorously inspecting the material to see if it was properly chosen and packed. I am kidding......sort of. Actually, Stefan did mention that his father, an engineer, had developed, just as an intellectual exercise, several innovative techniques and procedures for packing live plant material. They were useful here; everything arrived in perfect condition. There is a list somewhere to the right.

I am excited about Cornus rugosa, a plant who's virtues, Stefan, will extol at the drop of a cornus reference. Also Rosa blanda, whether it is a hybrid or not has retained beautiful red winter color in it's stems. We have been working on increasing our numbers of Ostrya, Joan wanted an Amalanchier laevis, and Carex albursina promised to be a great plant. Plenty of new material for the now irrestibly accessible North Woods.