#mitchella

Partridge berry and coralberry from the other day 🍒

A few odds and ends from my hike up on Snake Hill yesterday. I was looking for a big rattler to photograph but had to settle for a junior-sized youngster coiled up on a rock ledge (see earlier post). More finds: great rhododendron (Rhododendron maximum), which starts to bloom as the mountain laurel flowers fade; Indian cucumber-root (Medeola virginiana) an edible shade-lover with delicate, suspended flowers; partridgeberry (Mitchella repens) a lovely trailing vine whose white flowers are replaced by blazing red berries in the fall; whorled loosestrife (Lysimachia quadrifolia), a harbinger of summer in Appalachia; Indian pipe (Monotropa uniflora), a parasitic perennial herb also known as ghost plant and corpse plant; black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta), a short-lived perennial that never fails to give me a warm fuzzy inside; American black elderberry (Sambucus canadensis), also known as American elder and Canada elderberry, whose dark, ripe berries will shortly be fermenting in impromptu home wineries throughout Appalachia; and a red eft, the juvenile form of the eastern newt (Notophthalmus viridescens); starting its perilous journey to adulthood.

Partridgeberry - Mitchella repens

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Partridge Berry, Mitchella repens (by me)

Vidcund wishes their house were ready. It seems to him the contractors stay away more often than they do any work. No doubt military contracts are diverting personnel. But it may be a good thing for Monica to have her baby here, with all hands on deck. On the other hand - they're only moving next door, so everybody would still be on hand and she deserves her own house...argh. He's going to lie awake half the night thinking about it, isn't he? While Monica sleeps soundly...because she's Monica and nothing fazes her and she's wonderful.

5/17 at Historic Yates Mill County Park

Pascal and Christy are getting into the swing of being married. Pascal is anxious for another baby, and Christy doesn't mind being honeymooned at all.  Mitchella has decided to ignore all the grownups in favor of bringing kids home and playing loudly with them, to show that she Doesn't Care about Daddy's stupid marriage.