Moving: frequently underestimated

Moving always comes with unexpected problems. After living in Missoula, MT for the last two years, I moved up to Kalispell for this internship. I uprooted quite an extensive system of familiarity, but there are some connections that withstand the uprooting and room is made for new ones. I have had to regroup and reassess what relationships sustain me, and what resources and opportunities to pursue. The relationships built in human and ecological communities can both sustain and harm the player/actor and it is impossible in either world to live outside the web of connections. My co-intern and I have seen and learned a lot since we started a month ago, and below I share some stories of plants we encountered in their interconnected ecological webs, and the unusual and unique ways of life they devise to survive in their communities.  

Busy bees and toxic pollen

Flowering plants can develop intimate relationships with their pollinators, like the bumble bee. Some plants require a physical vibration to release pollen held tightly to their anthers, and bumble bees, unlike honeybees, can perform the essential “buzz pollination” that can shake this pollen loose (Dolan et al. 2021). Montana is a uniquely diverse state for bumble bees, with 28 species documented in Montana out of the 45 total found in North America (north of Mexico). This month we participated in the Montana Bumble Bee Atlas project, a community science project gathering data for tracking and conserving bumble bees (Bumble Bee Atlas). We traveled up the gravel road running alongside the North Fork of the Kalispell River (west of Glacier Park) to reach meadows of lupine and buckwheat flowers. The catch-and-release survey we conducted was a small data point in this comprehensive project aimed at sampling hundreds of locations across Montana.

Some plants may require buzz pollination, but at least there are several different species of bumble bees to do the job. The Mountain death camas, Zigadenus elegans, has only one pollinator: the miner bee. The death camas is flowering right now, and the plant’s cream-colored flowers, dotted with green nectaries, look inviting. True to its name, however, the entire plant is toxic. Everything from the bulbs to the nectar and pollen contain the deadly neurotoxin zygacene. All pollinators but the miner bee, Andrena astragali, would drop dead if they tasted from this flower. A single bulb is enough to kill a human. Why would a plant kill all but one of its pollinators? The answer lies in the usefulness of the toxin to the miner bee. The kleptoparasitic cuckoo bee lays its eggs next to the miner bee eggs, expecting a meal from the food cache the miner bee left for its own young. Once hatched, the cuckoo bee eats the toxic food cache, laced with zygacene poison from the death camas plant. Only the miner bee has an innate immunity, so the kleptoparasite dies, ridding the miner beehive of the pest. In return, the mountain death-camas gains a loyal, mutually codependent pollinator (Mitton 2022).

The making of a unique community: the fen and friends

Many of the rare plants we are searching for are encountered in wetlands, particularly fens. A fen is characterized by the presence of peat (sphagnum moss), a pH greater than 6 (neutral to basic), and a year-round supply of mineral-rich groundwater (Keddy 2010). The groundwater chemistry of a fen system determines the fen’s pH, with more basic fens considered “rich” in terms of species richness and more acidic fens considered “poor” (Wassen et al. 1996). Rich fens are often fed by groundwater running through limestone, which produces a bicarbonate buffer against acidity.

We surveyed a rich fen and a poor fen this month. The rich fen was a checkerboard of little microclimates, each inhabited by distinct species carving out little niches. We saw the rare orchid Liparis loeselii, a picky plant, that requires the convergence of many conditions: mossy tussocks to create microtopography, open vegetation, calcareous waters, and specific mycorrhizal fungi associations (Maris et al. 2023). Mycorrhizal associations are of particular importance to orchids. The dust-like seeds of orchids lack energy reserves for the embryo to germinate (Jacquemyn et al. 2017). During orchid germination, mycorrhizae send out hyphae that penetrate the cell wall and feed carbohydrates and nutrients to the tiny orchid. Without this intervention, the orchid lacks the fundamental building blocks to continue development. Different studies have shown the specificity of these associations, revealing the Liparis loeselii preference for a specific saprotrophic fungi in the Tulasnellaceae genus (Maris et al. 2023).

We also surveyed a poor fen composed predominantly of sphagnum (peat) mosses. The sphagnum mosses acidify and lower the nutrient availability of fens. Both the rich and poor fen contained Drosera rotundifolia, a sundew, but the poor fen contained larger patches. Sundew associate with sphagnum moss, which create floating mossy tussocks of desirable sundew habitat. The high-water table of a fen creates unique challenges for plant species, since nutrients from the soil are not easily attained. Sundew supplements its nitrogen needs by carnivalizing insects (Millett et al. 2012). The plants attract insects with a sugary, sticky mucus that coats the end of many little red stalks on their leaves. Once prey makes contact, the plant can move its tentacle-like leaves, a response called thigmonasty, to place the insect in contact with as many stalks as possible. The plant secretes digestive enzymes that dissolve the insect, and the leaf surface absorbs the nutrient-rich ex-insect soup.

Turning tables: myco-heterotrophic and parasitic plants

Almost all orchids are myco-heterotrophic at some point in their lifecycle and with maturity they produce chlorophyll and begin making food of their own. Some orchid species, like those in the Corallorhiza genus, never “grow up” and they remain fully to partially myco-heterotrophic throughout their lifespan. Myco-heterotrophy are reversed plant-mycorrhiza relationships, where carbon exchange goes from fungus to plant (Trudell et al. 2003). These plants are sometimes referred to as “mycorrhizal cheaters.” Lying in the subterranean darkness for most of their lives, these plants mimic their mushroom host’s life cycle, popping up from the ground only to produce a reproductive structure (Zimmer et al. 2008).

While Corallorhiza and other myco-heterotrophic orchids parasitize fungi, the plant species of the Broomrape family (Orobancheae) parasitize other plants. The seeds of Orobanche uniflora stay in the soil for years, lying in wait until certain chemicals released from nearby plant hosts stimulate germination. The seedlings put out haustoria, rootlike structures, which delve into nearby host root tissue, siphoning off water and nutrients (Kokla & Melnyk 2018). The Latin work “haustor” translates to “the one who drains” and these little vampiric plants have an apt common name: cancer root.

References

Dolan, Amelia., et al. “Bumble Bees in Montana.” MSU Extension, Aug. 2021, https://apps.msuextension.org/montguide/guide.html?sku=MT201611AG

Jacquemyn H, Waud M, Brys R, Lallemand F, Courty P-E, Robionek A and Selosse M-A (2017) Mycorrhizal Associations and Trophic Modes in Coexisting Orchids: An Ecological Continuum between Auto- and Mixotrophy. Front. Plant Sci. 8:1497. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2017.01497

Keddy, Paul A. (2010). Wetland ecology: principles and conservation (2nd ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-139-22365-2. OCLC 801405617

Kokla A., Melnyk C. W. (2018). Developing a thief: Haustoria formation in parasitic plants. Developmental Biology, 442 (1) (2018), pp. 53-59, 10.1016/j.ydbio.2018.06.013

Maris, Louise & Petrolli, Rémi & Selosse, Marc & Legland, Thomas & Pache, Gilles & Griveau, Chantal & Torre, Franck & Lopez-Pinot, Dominique & Marciau, Roger & Bonnet, Véronique. (2023). Impact of the local environmental factors associated to plant-fungi communities on the conservation of Liparis loeselii (L.) Rich. In the French Rhône-Alpes region. Acta Oecologica. 120. 10.1016/j.actao.2023.103929.

Millett, J.; Svensson, B. M.; Newton, J.; Rydin, H. (July 2012). “Reliance on prey-derived nitrogen by the carnivorous plant Drosera rotundifolia decreases with increasing nitrogen deposition”. New Phytologist. 195 (1): 182–188. doi:10.1111/j.1469-8137.2012.04139.x. PMID 22506640

Mitton, Jeff. “A Rare Relationship between Death Camas and Death Camas Miner Bees.” Colorado Arts and Sciences Magazine, 1 Apr. 2022, www.colorado.edu/asmagazine/2022/04/01/rare-relationship-between-death-camas-and-death-camas-miner-bees.

Trudell, SA; Rygiewicz, PT; Edmonds, RL (2003). “Nitrogen and carbon stable isotope abundances support the myco-heterotrophic nature and host-specificity of certain achlorophyllous plants” (PDF). New Phytologist. 160 (2): 391–401. doi:10.1046/j.1469-8137.2003.00876.x. PMID 33832180.

Wassen, M.J., van Diggelen, R., Wolejko, L. et al. A comparison of fens in natural and artificial landscapes. Vegetation 126, 5–26 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00047758

Zimmer K, Meyer C, Gebauer G (2008) The ectomycorrhizal specialist orchid Corallorhiza trifida is a partial myco-heterotroph. New Phytol 178:395–400. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-8137.2007.02362.x

I think it’s finally beginning to sink in that I work in a national forest. I’ve had a lot of jobs in my lifetime. Many of them were less than noteworthy- like the fast food places I worked at in high school. Others, I really enjoyed, like the ones related to my degree that I had in college. Perhaps the best of those, was the job I had working at the Crop Physiology Laboratory for my university. I have always enjoyed being in the lab, and in the greenhouses. But nothing compares to the national forest. It’s my favorite office I’ve had so far. Sure, sometimes it can be quite a walk to the nearest coffee machine, and the bathrooms aren’t always stocked with all of the amenities that one typically requires, but the views are spectacular- better than all of the high rise offices in New York City, no doubt.

Things are going really well here around the office. We’ve been able to get quite a bit done the last couple of weeks. At this point, I find myself wishing that the seeds would ripen faster. We are adding to our queue of harvestable populations faster than we can harvest them. Most of this is attributed to the fact that many of our species will not set seed until late summer. So we wait, and scout for more populations, and wait more. Certainly, we will be very busy with seed collecting once early fall rolls around.

Luckily, there are a few species that we have been able to harvest from this early in the season. There is nothing more satisfying than harvesting seed from a population that you have been monitoring. It’s so rewarding seeing the process from beginning to end: scouting the population, counting it, mapping it, photographing it, doing return visits on it, and then finally, when the time is right, harvesting it.

Last week, we collected again from a Lomatium dissectum species that we found our first day out in the field. We had monitored it for weeks. While we were happy that we were able to get seed, we were a little disappointed that we hadn’t found more harvestable populations of this species before they set seed. This particular plant matures and sets seed quite rapidly and early in the season. Luckily, before we were able to get too down in the dumps about it, we discovered the magic of higher elevation.

We knew of course that plants at higher elevations experience cold temperatures later into the year, and thus take longer to germinate, sprout and set seed than plants at lower elevations. But we hadn’t considered this in the context of seed collection. Not until we came across a huge, and still very much blooming population of Lomatium dissectum in one of the highest elevation areas on our forest. It felt like a second chance! This particular population appears to be months behind the population that we harvested last week. We will get to harvest more Lomatium dissectum after all!

Life is good. The forest is beautiful. Seeds are coming!

Last spring, when I decided on the Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit for my CLM location, the reality of moving across the country had not yet occurred to me. I was just excited to explore a beautiful place I’d never been! Aside from a couple b’nai mitzvah when I was younger, I’ve never spent much time on the West Coast. As a third generation New Yorker, its nothing short of treason to think about moving out west. The night before my flight, after a healthy amount of crying and hugging my best friends, I started worrying about leaving them, the Northeast, and all its familiar plants.

On my first day in Tahoe, I went for a bike ride to the Forest Service office to get to know the route. I took in the views of the snowcapped mountains, the cool, dry air, and the fields of wildflowers. Smiling and feeling a bit more settled, I rounded the corner and was immediately too close to the second bear I’d seen in my life (the first was as I drove into town). After getting some distance from the bear, I had a little moment of panic, followed by concerns that I’d be late on my first day of work because of a bear in my path.

Thankfully, that problem hasn’t come up (yet). For most of my first week, I worked with the rest of the botany crew to restore a meadow along Burke Creek. With the help of the crew, I quickly began recognizing invasive plants and their native lookalikes. Target species for removal included spotted knapweed (Centaurea stoebe), sulfur cinquefoil (Potentilla recta), and what quickly became my least favorite plant of all time, bull thistle (Cirsium vulgare). If you have never had the misfortune of laying eyes on Cirsium vulgare, picture the most hostile-looking weed you can, covered in spines that end up lining your work gloves. Mess with the bull thistle, get the thorns. We cut off and bagged any bull thistle flower heads before uprooting the plant, ensuring no viable seeds would enter the seed bank this year. As I identified and pulled out weed after weed, I started to feel a bit more rooted in my new environment.

My co-intern, Gerardo, and I then began working with one of our target species, whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis), by scouting for viable seed collection trees. Whitebark pine is listed as a federally threatened species, largely due to an invasive fungal pathogen called white pine blister rust (Cronartium ribicola). In our surveys, we are looking for healthy, mature whitebark pines within infected stands. These individuals have likely been exposed to the fungus and remain uninfected, indicating the potential for resistant offspring. Whitebark pines primarily live in the subalpine zone (9,000 to 11,000 ft in elevation), so we drove a forest service Silverado up into the mountains to find them. Aside from the initial terror of driving a federally-owned truck on rocky dirt roads and a touch of elevation sickness, the scouting was a great way to see the Basin; the views from the peaks were incredible.

 As my second week at LTBMU comes to a close, I am so grateful to my past self for making this decision without any consideration of future anxieties. The Basin is one of the most beautiful places I’ve been in my life and every day I get to explore more of it. I am so excited for the rest of my field season! As much as I miss my friends, getting to know the LTBMU botany crew has been so fun and reassuring. I also suspect I may lure some of my friends here with my daily pictures of our field sites. To quote a response to my field photo from this morning, “ur lying and evil and I hate you and im legit gonna look for flights rn. is there a lake tahoe airport? where does one fly into.”

Despite my fair share of bull-thistle-inflicted stab wounds, I am starting to fall in love with South Lake Tahoe, California. I’m definitely not ready to say West Coast best coast, but West Coast…equally great coast!

“Bloom where you’re planted,” you whisper to the water lily seed as you cast her into the sweet rich earth of a tallgrass prairie, no open water in sight.

A foundational idea in seed collecting is the existence of seed transfer zones: regions within which plants can be transferred with a great likelihood of successful propagation. Sure, hoary tansyaster – Machaeranthera canescens – grows across the West. But evidence shows that seeds collected from North Dakota’s glacial plains are unlikely to survive long in Arizona’s semi-arid highlands. If we’re thoughtful about where a population comes from and the condition to which that population is adapted, we should have a better outcome when reseeding that population in restoration projects.

This idea is challenging for me in our current era. Not the idea of transfer zones; I understand how plants adapt deeply to an ecosystem. Plant species move around pretty slowly all things considered. Birds and bears and other animals scatter their seeds, sure, but they don’t have wings or legs of their own.

Here’s what challenges me. The climate is changing, warming quickly. Precipitation patterns are less reliable. Some of our coworkers in New Mexico are dealing with fires and floods, and others are experiencing the leftovers of Hurricane Beryl. Every month is the hottest month on record. It’s hard to understand what this means for seeds, who have spent millennia adapting to more predictable environments. There is a real possibility that a lot of the species we’re collecting now won’t survive these fast changes, and for me the instability of all of this seems like it would really impact the idea of a transfer zone.

But there, dense bunches of threeawn grass growing densely through cracks in the hot Tucson asphalt. Bushes of mock vervain erupting in the rubble where Southwestern canyons were detonated for mining projects or to build the border wall. Cheerful sunflower – never a species to be contained – filling up the highway margins and spilling down the railroad easements. Understanding where a plant can thrive, in which conditions a species can survive, is far beyond my job description and personal intellect.

There’s probably some wisdom here about how we’re all in our own version of transfer zones, with places where we are more likely to grow and thrive, and places that would wither us immediately. I’ll leave you to decide what this analogy means for you. I’m personally very excited to be in the Sonoran Desert, where ferns grow next to cacti and yucca, where I can grow in my experiences of plant identification and understanding the diverse ecosystems of the Coronado National Forest (which has low desert and alpine forest and oak scrubland and everything in between). I can’t be sure, but I think I’m planted somewhere I’ll bloom.

Driving up from the Central Valley of California, I was struck by the rapidly changing landscape as I wound my way up Highway 50. Already, I knew I was lucky to work here for the next several months. Not only was I met with gorgeous views, I noticed a remarkably cooler temperature, feeling grateful to escape the almost-one-hundred-degree heat back home.

Lake Tahoe is nested within the Tahoe Basin, surrounded by peaks on all sides. At about 6,500 feet above sea level, the Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit is where I will employ, hone, and develop my skills as botanist.

Almost immediately, I began exploring the flora of the Lake Tahoe region, expanding my collection of iNaturalist observations. Being at a such a high elevation, this area can support plants unique from the lower, hotter, and drier areas to the east and west. Some of my favorite sightings of native plants include Scouler’s St. John’s wort (Hypericum scouleri), white bog orchid (Platanthera dilatata), Washington lily (Lilium washingtonianum, although it was not in bloom), and Oregon checker mallow (Sidalcea oregana). The majority of these were found growing in meadows or along streams. The Washington lily, however, inhabited a very sunny and dry slope.

A lot of my time in the field so far has been spent remediating introduced species invasion to reduce their impact on native flora and their habitat. One of the particularly prolific species is bull thistle (Cirsium vulgare). Bull thistle tends to grow in damp areas–in the vicinity of streams or in wet meadows. The preferred treatment for this weed is manual pulling, with a hori-hori making sure to take as much of the thick taproot as possible. If a plant begins bolting or flowering, the inflorescence has to be cut, bagged, and tossed in the garbage. Its sharp spines make leather gloves absolutely necessary. A native look-alike species, Anderson’s thistle (Cirsium andersonii) looks extremely similar, and I spent some time learning to distinguish the two. For one, the flower head is vase-shaped in bull thistle and cylinder-shaped in Anderson’s. The leaves on bull thistle are much rougher and its stems grow spines. It is also very helpful that Anderson’s thistle usually grow in drier locations, so the two species often don’t overlap.

Toward the end of the month, me and Kendall, my co-intern, have begun preliminarily checking out seed collection sites, and I am especially looking forward to doing more work with the whitebark pine. I hope there is much to update about this in the future.

Before moving to Tucson – everyone who had lived here at some point in their lives would always tell me how great monsoon season was. I didn’t get my hopes up as for the last 2 years, Tucson has experienced especially long, hot and dry summers.

But, to my surprise – I like to imagine it as a wholesome welcome gift to me – the environment has brought not just an early monsoon season but a generous one. The most rewarding part of experiencing this summer’s desert rain is witnessing the ocotillos transition from barren to happy & thriving within just a matter of days – it’s a wonderful reminder of how resilient nature can be.

Within my first few weeks of working on the Coronado crew, we had the opportunity to camp for two nights at the top of Mt. Graham to assist Soil Scientists – Henry and Eric – in identifying plants within their study site. I never been humbled as quickly as being thrown into ID-ing sedges on my first botanizing trip. Never will I ever take my beloved hand lens for grated again.

Overall, my experience work in Coronado NF so far has been equally challenging and exciting – and I’m very grateful I get to do this work.

Some things I’m especially grateful for this week

• hearing Mexican Spotted Owls singing in the night
• liquidIV
• my co-intern/ now friend Bees validating me on my truck driving abilities
• the Mt. Graham meadow where I identified my first graminoid
• monsoon storms lowering the Arizona temp by 10 degrees
• camp site ramen after a long day’s work
• the humidity rehydrating my dry desert skin
• desert sunsets and morning walks to my field office

More of a re-potting, really… Here we are in Sheridan, Wyoming! To the West, the Big Horn National Forest rises up from gentle foothills blanketed in Yellow Sweet Clover. Within the forest, the Cloud Peak Wilderness juts into the sky, Cloud Peak poking its crown higher than 13,000 feet! The air here is rarer than in the mountains familiar to me, Washington’s Cascades and Olympics. Just a few weeks ago, I plucked up my roots from my hometown of Seattle to embark on an adventure to learn the flora of the rest of the country and to provide a valuable resource for conservation projects in our National Forests: Native seeds!

It’s early in the season, especially at the higher elevations in the forest. Snow had just melted out of the montane meadows only a few weeks before we arrived in early June. This means many plants are just coming out, and the earliest blooms are now in flower. Still too early to collect seed! Right now, the Rocky Mountain Herbarium Specimen Database and iNaturalist have been our best friends as we use historic records to locate populations of plants on our collection list. Some of the best finds have been several great populations of Eriogonum umbellatum (Sulfur buckwheat) in flower that will be ready for collection in a week or two.

There’s a lot to know on any one Forest, and when we’re not out scouting populations for seed collection, we’re getting a grand tour of the scope of what a Forest Service botany crew works on day in and day out.  

We’ve been out with hydrologists planning the best spots for willow plantings in a wetland restoration site with beaver dam analogs. The willows need moist spots that won’t get too waterlogged, and they’ll need to be fenced in for protection (baby willows are tasty moose munch!)

We’ve documented locations of sensitive species, keying out the sensitive Linanthus watsonii in the field, which looks a lot like its more common cousin, Phlox hoodii. We located Linanthus very near to a popular climbing spot in Ten Sleep Canyon, which gets a LOT of traffic, so botanists here need to assess what special precautions should be taken to protect this special plant. 

Along the way, there have been plenty of Foresters to meet, landmarks to learn, and of course, plants to get excited about. We’re getting the lay of the land and picking up the lingo too—if you told us there’s Monarda past Burgess up on Freeze Out, we’d know exactly what you mean (and we’d be pumped!)  

“In indigenous ways of knowing, it is understood that each living being has a particular role to play. Every being is endowed with certain gifts, its own intelligence, its own spirit, its own story.”
― Robin Wall Kimmerer, Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses

When I think of carnivorous plants I imagine the jungles of South America and swamplands of Florida and Australia. When I think of Sphagnum moss I imagine the peat bogs of Northern Ireland. When I think of these species together, I do not think of Northwestern Montana.

It turns out Northwestern Montana has intermittent patches of a very specific ecosystem type known as a fen. Fens are a type of wetland where water sits or flows year round close to the ground surface which prevents the decomposition of organic material which leads to the formation of peaty poor in nutrients soil (Weixelman & Cooper 2009). While fens are found all over the world, the type of fen found in Northwestern Montana is considered a Rocky Mountain Subalpine-Montane Fen (Montana Field Guides) and due to the year round presence of water, these fens are biodiversity hotspots!

On Monday June 24th my crew and I drove down and forest service road to go set up a long term study in the Porcupine Fen to observe species richness and abundance over time (photos 1-2) This was my first time experiencing an ecosystem like this and I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. Approaching the fen we trudged through mucky sticky water and tangled shrubs until we got to a clearing, upon first glace it just looks like a grassy shrub land, but then you look a little closer…

… the intensity of species richness is easy to see! Not only are fens one of the only habitats in Montana where one can find Sphagnum Moss in abundance, it is the only ecosystem were you can find Montana’s incredible and unexpected native carnivorous sundew species!

Drosera rotundifolia and Drosera anglica are species of sundew, a type of flowering plant that has adapted to live peaty poor soil nutrient conditions found in fens. The adaption you ask? Capturing and digesting small invertebrates!

Drosera species accomplish this carnivorous act by showing off beautifully bright red spike-like “tentacles” on it’s leaves that have mucilage that glistens in the sun like dew drops. When an insect lands on one of these attractive leaves, they become stuck, unable to free themselves. The plant then releases proteins that will digest the insect so that the plant can absorb ammonia and other key nutrients they’re missing from the poor peat like soil quality (Flora of North America).

Sundews are not the only species that have evolved to live in these low nutrient conditions. We observed several rare orchid species that are also only found in peaty bog like environments (photos 5-7). However, instead of consuming insects to supplement their nutrition needs, these orchids rely on their symbiotic relations with mycorrhizal fungi ( Maris et al., 2023).

Seeing such a unique environment was really inspiring. As a young scientist there’s nothing quite like exploring an ecosystem that has so much left to be discovered. The relationship between these flowing plants, the carnivorous plants, the moss, and the mycorrhizal fungi in these fen systems is extremely under researched and has me thinking a lot about future project ideas.

I am looking forward to exploring more fens and other unique Montana ecosystems that inspire me this summer, including alpine white park pine habitat! (but that’s for another blog post 🙂

– Erynn
Flathead National Forest, MT