Skunk Cabbage Trail

Yesterday I went for an 8 mile hike on the Skunk Cabbage Trail. It was an excellent hike because it covers three different habitats: Sitka Spruce (Picea sitchensis)and Red Alder(Alnus rubra)dominated forest to Coast Redwood (Sequoia sempervirens)forest and then finally coastal scrub. With all of these habitats, I saw a wide diversity of bryophytes, a few lichens, many mushrooms, and some beautiful angiosperms.

This snag is covered with the Icicle Moss (Isothecium myosuroides)

This is definitely some kind of Polytrichopsidan moss, maybe even a Polytrichum sp.

Redwood Sorrel(Oxalis oregana)carpets the floor of the Redwood dominated forest

Fairy Bells (Disporum smithii)

I believe that these are Turkey Tail mushrooms (Trametes versicolor) but it has been a while since Forest Pathology. They had a poroid hymenophore

This picture is a bit blurry but it works. This is Bleeding Heart (Dicentra formosa)and I was excited to see it because I had never seen it on a hike before

False Lily of the Valley (Maianthemum dilatatum)

These mushrooms are probably Armillaria sp because they were on an old Alder snag. I didn't check for rhizomorphs

Rhizomnium glabrescens

Buckiella undulatum

This lichen, Peltigera membranecea, was all over the trees and on the ground, but usually growing on some moss. Looks like it is growing on Kindbergia praelonga

Frullania sp on Alder

This is the first time I have seen Conocephalum conicum in the wild even though it is really common

Plagiomnium insigne was growing very thickly on the sides of the path

This is Wild Cucumber (Marah oreganus) and unfortunately the spiky cucumber fruits are not edible. It also makes the giant taproot seen below

We stumbled upon this huge root (I have actually seen a bigger one before on the HSU campus). We cut into it and it was quite soft and actually smelled really good

Kindbergia praelonga was very abundant in the coastal and Sitka Spruce/Alder dominated areas

Disclaimer: I did some pretty lazy botanizing and identified many of these species based on other pictures and books I have without doing any keying. So there is a good chance some of the species could be wrong.