Storms and the Woods

Five days ago the Woods had a good 0.7 inch of rain followed by a storm three days ago with strong 80 mph wind gusts and another 0.9 inch.  Yesterday, Saturday afternoon I went for a walk in the Woods from the NW entrance.

I was impressed with the amount of fresh blow down - very interesting. The cottonwoods seem to have lost the most - small branches with clusters of green leaves and larger diameter limbs. One of the largest cottonwoods  (#123) by Carpenter's post now looks like it will fall. The roots on the west side are lifted and the massive tree looks more tilted. (Thoughts of the 'Home Tree' from the film 'Avatar'.) Box elder, green ash and catalpa also lost lots of green canopy. I was surprised how light catalpa branches are. Interesting time to walk around and examine leaf clusters fresh on the ground. Some interesting galling and other herbivory.

  The trail loop I walked (NW entrance to East Pond, Northern Loop to Island Crossing up to the Tree Loop, around that clockwise down to the Elm Bridge Crossing, then back west via the East West Trail) - is blocked in several places by blow down, but you can get around easily enough.

  An interesting time to go see and think about disturbance giving new forest structure. There are a lot of broken trees and new rich resources on the ground. 

The rain produced a crop of small bronze-colored agarics through the Woods. Caps the size of half dollars.

Oliver's Woods is Falling Down

Wow, what a lot of change in the Woods! First time in there in a few weeks.
The western central Woods has had a half dozen of it largest old bur oak snags fall this past month, taking down middle-aged elms and green ash with them.  In more than a decade of visiting the Woods, I've never seen this much windfall and change. The big bur oaks have been dead from flooding in this section for many years. Their roots have finally rotted away. The wet soil from many 2017 spring rains and the moderately gusty wind storms 20-40 mph have brought many dead trees down and broken, decapitated or crushed the young/ middle-aged elm, green ash and others growing around them. (Potential dendrochronology co-occurrence of good wide ring width intervals from abundant rain and stormy weather, with more scars from falling trees wounding survivors?)
Western trails blocked in two places by one massive bur oak and one other.
Under the big persimmon trees, small urn-shaped off-white flowers are falling. The sound is like the beginning of a light rain shower. Faint pleasant smell of melon.
Around the big pecan trees, there are temporary carpets of spent catkins. Near the cottonwoods, there are small tufts of white cotton drifted to ground. The dark soft organic soil in the west is covered here and there with thousands and thousands of new bright green seeds dropped from green ash. So much effort is spent in reproduction. Now spent and done. Trees are devoting their time and resources toward growth now.
I notice all the abundant animal digging along the west side of the Tree Loop (armadillo?).
The Wash from the Elm Bridge southward is layered in new blonde sand. There must have been a new construction project washout somewhere upstream.