Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Wildflower Wednesday-Our Local Rail-Trail

I've featured wildflowers from the Vestal Rail Trail (where I do a lot of my exercise walks) in Vestal, NY in many of my Wildflower Wednesday posts.  It turns out this rail trail is a rich source for wildflowers.  A lot of it is in full sun but increasingly there are shady areas.  There are dry areas and wetlands, so we get a good mix of habitats.

This is a little history of the Rails-to-Trails movement, which explains this movement is over 40 years old.  We've had our rail trail some 20 years, I believe - and spouse and I have done a lot of walking on it.

It measures 2.1 miles and there is a plan to expand it - money permitting, of course.

This is the 'head' of the trail.  On the bottom right, you can see Queen Anne's Lace in bloom.

Here is a wild grape plant, with its small cluster.


I was thinking this was purple loosestrife but I wonder if this may be fireweed instead.  These plants aren't in a place which I can get to easily to look at leaves, etc.


This is my mystery flower of the week. This came out blurry, and I apologize.  There are a lot of these flowers.  The stalks are top heavy and they are dragging on the ground.  They looked white in the wild, but in this photo have a little purple in them.

Finally, white asters.  Blame my bad back (which has been stiff lately) for the focus, which could be better.
Have a happy August, all.  May my fellow bloggers in drought areas get rain soon.

1 comment:

  1. I wish I had your knowledge of wildflowers! We just hiked the Widfross Trail along the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, and there were so many wildflowers blooming. The only one I recognized were lupines. Perhaps I need to check into your blog more often to learn more about wildflowers!

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