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More from the Tennesee Wilderness

A red eft – the juvenile stage of the Eastern newt – is all but hidden on the forest floor.

Cat McCue and Jeff Hunter took a walk in the proposed new Wilderness area in east Tennessee. Here’a a snapshot of what they saw as well as details on the bill:

What We Saw

Flame azalea

Mountain laurel

Galax

Sweet shrub

Bluets

Trillium

Rattlesnake plantain

Red eft

Dusky salamander

Crayfish

Wild turkey

What We Heard

Red-eyed vireo

Veery

Scarlet tanager

Pileated woodpecker

Rose-breasted grosbeak

Wood thrush

Blue headed vireo

Hooded warbler

What We Heard About

Three bear cubs – reported by another hiker who’d just passed them. They must have scampered off.

The Wilderness Bill (click for pdfs)

Upper Bald River Wilderness Area (9,038 acres, Monroe County)

Joyce Kilmer/Slickrock addition (1,836 acres, Monroe County)

Big Frog addition (348 acres, Polk County)

Little Frog addition (966 acres, Polk County)

Big Laurel Branch addition (4,446 acres, Carter and Johnson counties)

Sampson Mountain addition (2,922 acres, Washington and Unicoi counties)

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May’s Wild Edible: White Jelly Snow Fungus

“Pass the fungus,” is not common dinnertime conversation in the Blue Ridge Mountains region, but that’s because folks perhaps have not heard of the white jelly snow fungus.
Wild garlic growing in Fayette County, West Virginia.

April’s Wild Edible: Wild Garlic

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A May apple in bloom in Southwest Virginia.

March’s Wild Edible: May Apple

Sometime this month in the Blue Ridge Mountains, one of these highlands’ signature spring plants will ease from the soil … the May apple (Podophyllum peltatum).
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March’s Mountain Wildflower: Rue Anemone

A member of the buttercup family and found in the open woodlands, rue anemone (Thalictrum thalictroides) has long, thin stems that tremble in the slightest of winds—prompting its other common name, windflower.
Pokeweed growing in Floyd County, Virginia.

January’s Wild Edible: Pokeweed

Pokeweed is one of the wild plants that is most associated with the Blue Ridge Region.
A purple-spored puffball growing in a field in Botetourt County, VA.

December’s Wild Edible: Purple-Spored Puffball

The purple-spored typically grows in this region’s fields, often appearing from October through December and into early January.
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Ride the Rails, Explore Rockbridge County: Make a Weekend of the 611 in Goshen!

This fall, one of America’s most iconic steam locomotives is making tracks and memories.
The compound, lancelike leaflets of the bitternut are a good identifier.

November’s Wild Edible: Bitternut Hickory

Frankly, this native species to the Blue Ridge mountains comes by its name honestly.
Mullein growing in Ingram's backyard.

October’s Wild Edible: Mullein

Earlier, this year, a lone mullein plant appeared along the fence that encloses my garden, which made me curious about this plant.

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