Catawba Nights

Howdy all, are you ready for the weekend? Big day on Saturday for us at the Division of Natural Areas and Preserves, our annual Cranberry Bog open house, and we have 550 people signed up, with walkups sure to come as well. It makes for a long day, especially if it is hot and sunny.

Some of you have seen my TA Photography blog where I put some of my favorite images that I've recently taken. I've set that blog up to be a photo gallery- the images are much larger there. I just added a thirty second time exposure from our Lake Erie trip two weeks ago. Here's a sample, but it looks so much better just a little bigger and viewed on a black background. See it here.

Tom

Catawba Marshes, Lake Erie

The floating leaved marshes between the mainland and Catawba Island provided for amazing reflective sunsets. I took this image from the parking lot of our hotel.

It's just too bad that the non-native invasive species, that giant grass in the foreground, Phragmites australis subsp. australis, or simply "Phragmites", has become so prevalent along the lakeshore. For more about this nasty plant, you need to watch this video.

There is a native subspecies of Phragmites, Phragmites australis subspecies americanus that isn't invasive, but it is quite rare. I've found it in Lake Erie Marshes and prairie fens further inland.

Tom

Spread of the Giant Grass

Invasive Phragmites from Barbara Lucas on Vimeo.

Another great video produced by Barbara Lucas, this short film focuses on the non-native invasive Phragmites australis subsp. australis. Sometimes referred to as common or giant reed, many of us in "the biz" just call it Phragmites, pronounced frag-MY-tees. This plant is a wetland species, but will also grow on beaches and even wet, seeping hillsides- it doesn't need very much water. This is one plant that I've seen expand in my relatively short lifetime.

Also- There is a native phragmites that has been recently described and named Phragmites australis subsp. americanus. It too is mentioned in the video. Currently, this native grass is a state threatened species. I wrote and article detailing it in the 2007 Winter issue of Natural Ohio.

Tom