Until this weekend, I hadn’t seen mole crabs (Emerita talpoida) since I was a child. The lack of sightings was less to do with an absence of the crabs and more to do with the fact that I no longer dig holes and build sandcastles at the beach. My boyfriend and I were discussing these interesting little crabs as we walked down the beach yesterday and he wanted to see one. My suggestion: dig a hole in the wet sand….
There are two abundant but potentially easily overlooked wildflowers blooming in the forest right now. Both are relatively small plants with simple white flowers, but both can be found in relatively extensive patches on the forest floor if you look around. The first, and one of my personal favorite wildflowers, is the Canada Mayflower (Maianthemum canadense). Canada Mayflower, also known as False Lily-of-the-Valley, is a small plant between 2 and 6 inches in height. It begins with just a single…
Dandelions are a common wildflower in New England. Although native to Europe, they have spread nearly worldwide. Common dandelions (Taraxacum officinale) have bright yellow flowers 1 to 2 inches wide on top of hollow stalks, which extrude a milky latex-like liquid when broken. The stalk is surrounded by a ring of basal leaves that are variously cleft and lobed. While many home owners consider them unwelcome in their lawns, other seek them out as an early season wild edible. Due…
Painted turtles are one of the most widespread turtles in the North America, and are fairly common throughout Massachusetts. They prefer shallow bodies of water that offer places to haul out and bask in the sun, such as exposed rocks or fallen, partially submerged logs. They have a rather smooth shell, with red patterns along the outer edge, a yellow spot (sometimes elongated) behind their eye, and yellow stripes on their head and neck. There is a useful identification sheet…
Japanese knotweed (Fallopia japonica) is one of the most invasive weeds in the world. Native to Asia, It was introduced to the United States in the late 1800s as an ornamental plant. Although its delicate flowers are attractive when in bloom, they are rather too small to elicit much praise for their aesthetics today. It was also originally touted as being useful for stabilizing eroding roadsides and creating windbreaks due to its rapid growth habit. Japanese knotweed produces thousands of…