We meet at the Ballpark in Gillies Bay at 10:00am
Last week we had a cool day for our hike. There was a strong north-west wind and the prospect of some nice views so we headed south towards Bobs Lake and parked at the start of the Mt. Grant Trail. Taking the longer route to the summit to avoid the wet and muddy patches on the shorter northern route we found there were very few fallen trees to deal with along the way, but many sections were beginning to close in with recent vigorous branch growth. I did notice that some of the Ponderosa Pine trees that were planted on the dry mountain slopes about 35 years ago after a major forest fire were starting to die off. Many others are showing signs of stress, have lost a lot of their needles and look like they may not live very much longer. A government forester told me this species is prone to a disease that only affects this species in damp summer climates and not in the interior where summers are hotter and drier.
My photo is one I took a few weeks ago when I noticed a low cliff beside one of our hiking trails that had some lovely green clusters of tiny plantsgrowing on the almost vertical rock face. The fern is a tiny spleenwort with fronds like maidenhair fern, mosses, liverworts and the crusty grey plant on the rock is a species of lichen.
JD.
A miniature garden of tiny plants on the vertical face of a cliff in the forest.
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