We observed freshwater alligators at Huntington
Beach State Park, Brookgreen Plantation,
and with alligators occurring
throughout the coastal plain and sandhills of South Carolina. Fortunately most
all bodies of water that harbor gators are posted as such.
I read a story about the thousands of slaves
that worked the rice fields through the 1800's
and none feared predictable
alligators all that much. It was the water moccasin or
cottonmouth that
everyone mutually hated and feared! I'd definitely take along the
Taurus
Judge
.410 handgun when doing coastal plain and maritime wetland delineations.
The lubber grasshopper Brachystola magna
lives up to its Latin name magna,
coming in at all
of three-inches, a mammoth
sized beast of a grasshopper.
It must be the long South Carolina growing
season?!
This photo does not do justice to its size. It jumped and flew like a
small bird.
The plantation still had remnant patches of
non-native long-grained rice mixed
with many other herbaceous wetland plants, as
well as our native wild rice.
The
saw greenbriar Smilax bona-nox is a common southern species that
has thorns
and then teeth too boot on the linear leaves.
Saltmarsh morning glory Ipomoea
sagittata has leaves that look like arrowheads.
The word saggitata
means "arrow-shaped." I read a piece in a book by Bill Sipple,
wetlands
expert, on why so many wetland plants have arrow-shaped leaves, which I'll
elaborate on in a future e-mail.
Dog
fennel Eupatorium capillifolium is a weedy, salt-tolerant plant of
disturbed flatwoods
and marshes.
Sweet
pitcher-plant Sarracenia rubra is an uncommon to rare plant occurring
from North
Carolina through northern Florida. I found this plant in a sandhill
seep of Goodale State Park. This is the remains of the flowering parts above
the pitchers.
The Carolinas - Part IV
