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Hike Description:
Dennis Horn, TNPS Charter member/Author/Naturalist and botanical guru, will be our hike guide and lead us through middle Tennessee's Barrens ecosystem grassland species at Arnold Engineering Development Center and the May Prairie. Dennis is co-author of “Wildflowers of Tennessee,” and you can bring your copy for an autograph or purchase an updated edition at the hike.
Dennis will give us an opportunity to see several orchids and other rare plants. The “Oak Barrens” of Coffee County provide some of the best examples of TN rare plants that also occur in the Gulf Coastal Plain and the prairies of the Midwest. As a result, Coffee County is one of only three counties in Tennessee with > 50 rare species and AEDC botanists have documented 62 threatened or endangered plant species. We will visit the grasslands on grounds protected by Arnold Engineering Development Center (AEDC) first to see native orchids: tuberous grasspink (Calopogon tuberosus), spreading pogonia (Cleistesiopsis bifaria), and possibly ragged fringed orchid (Platanthera lacera) and rose pogonia (Pogonia ophioglossoides). We should also find slender blue flag (Iris prismatica), early blooms of death camas (aka Zigadenus leimanthoides, now Stenanthium tennesseense), whorled loosestrife (Lysimachia quadrifolia), and hyssop leaved skullcap (Scutellaria integrifolia). Other Tennessee rarities such as prairie gentian (Gentiana puberulenta), and 2 sunflowers (Helianthus eggertii and H. occidentalis) may be vegetative, but won’t bloom until late summer.
We will then take a short drive to visit May Prairie, a Class II Natural-Scientific State Natural Area. This is a prime example of a tall grass prairie remnant. It is also mixed with short grass prairie, and is bordered by both swamp forest and upland woods. This area provides examples of TN rare plants that are disjunct from the Gulf Coastal Plain and the prairies of the Midwest, with more than 300 species, 25 of which are rare in Tennessee. We should see paintbrush (Castilleja coccinea), marsh pea (Lathyrus palustris), Eastern prairie blue wild indigo (Baptisia aberrans), early blooms of dwarf huckleberry (Gaylussacia dumosa), horned bladderpod (Utricularia cornuta), and swamp candles (Lysimachia terrestris), 3 Eryngo species - creeping eryngo (Eryngium prostratum), possibly Eryngium mississippiense, formerly E. integrifolium, and vegetative rattlesnake master (Eryngium yuccifolium), coppery St. Johnswort (Hypericum denticulatum), mock bishop’s weed (Ptilimnium costatum), hairy bluestem (Andropogon hirsutior) and several other prairie species.
Bring lunch, snack, water, insect repellent, sunscreen, hat/parasol/umbrella +/- poncho depending on the weather, appropriate shoes for light trail hiking and change of shoes if desired in case they get wet, hiking poles/stick could be beneficial. No pets at any of our Wild Ones hikes please.
Rating: Easy walking through low to hip height vegetation. It is mostly level. Feet/ankles may get a bit wet against the vegetation.
Distance: ½ mile explorations at AEDC site. 1 mile loop at May Prairie. Duration 4 hours.
Related links:
Arnold Engineering Development Center (AEDC) iNaturalist May at May Prairie iNaturalist Spring wildflowers at AEDC Dennis Horn, Tennessee Botanist Hall of Fame |
