It's taken me a while to get up some of my Flora-quest photos because I've been busy wrapping up classes for my students. But, I finally made it happen last night. I've included a handful of my favorites with a quick run-down of my experience of the weekend. Flora-Quest is a great way to support the local economy and the environment because they try to promote environmental education and eco-tourism, proving the business is directly helped by environmentalism, rather than the old argument that environmentalism hurts business. Check out the
Flora-Quest Facebook page to see more photos and get a better idea what Flora-Quest is all about!
I started off the weekend by helping with registration with the brand new Flora-Quest Fellows. The Fellows helped make the weekend as smooth as possible and they added some great energy to the group! After registration, Guy Denny started the weekend off with his presentation on
"Ethnobotany", which focused on plants the Native American indigenous to Ohio used and revered. My husband and I later joined Megan Bihn and Tim Fulz (two of the Fellows) for a campfire, which included their great musical entertainment.
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| Flora-Quest Fellows: Mike Wang-Bell and Carmen DeLeon |
The next morning my husband, Mark, and I grabbed some breakfast and met up with our group. We were supposed to go canoeing, but because we'd had so much rain the previous night and days leading up to the event, our group decided to play it safe and just hike instead. Because Raven Rock was obscured with fog, we hiked at Snake Hollow first and then we made the vertical climb up to the summit of Raven Rock in the afternoon hoping it would clear up once the sun was up for a while.
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| Group 1 at Snake Hollow |
At Snake Hollow, we saw some interesting things and heard some great stories from our group leaders, Kevin Bradbury and Martin McAllister. Martin told us about the local flora as well as the old furnaces in the area and how the logging industry used to function back when logging was done with horses. I particularly got a kick out of one of the other group members who was constantly eating and chewing on whatever edible plants she could get her hands on! It became a game to find the next edible plant to supply her with.
Snake Hollow was unique in the beautiful gorge it boasts and the large number of pink lady slipper orchids. What's interesting about lady slippers is the fact that they grow with the help of an underground fungus, so it's not like they can just be uprooted and brought home to enjoy. They're very picky growers.
I also found an interesting fungus I'd never seen before and I was told it's called Devil's Urn. I just really liked the distinct shape and striking black color. As well, there was an abundance of red-spotted purple butterflies hanging around some horse poo and on the nearby elms. My husband was amazed to find out that so many butterflies love to nectar on dead animals and poo. He said he'd take it as a personal insult if a butterfly came over to land on him (which did happen the next day-- after he'd been out hiking for a while and was nice and sweaty).
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| Devil's Urn |
