MD Palmer State Park - Ironworks Trail

American Beech

 A heavy line of storms rolled through the evening before. With the day off, I decided to take Amos on his favorite kind of hike, a turtle tracking. The ground was wet and temperatures had cooled down from the stupidly hot week we just had, so it was perfect for box turtles to be active. When we arrived, I learned there had been a tree struck by lightening in the middle of Parker State Park area and a field crew was currently deployed to the interior, but, the lone firefighter waiting at the trucks and trailers assured me it was fine for hiking. 

Strike shards at 100 yards!

We followed UTV tracks and soon found strike shards littering the trail. They were long and pointed and ragged, like spears thrown down by some angry forest god. I launched one into the brush at an imaginary mastadon but not being very good at spear throwing, I  missed.  We climbed up the knoll where a great red oak, laid down by firefighters, smoldered and smoked. The soil was grubbed all around for fifty feet in every direction. The smell of acrid oak smoke made both Amos' and my eyes tear up. Back to the trail...

Lightening strike

We headed around the  Hornbeam Trail in hopes of picking up a turtle trail. The smell of smoke lingered the whole way and I began to wonder if there was another smoldering strike site somewhere else. If there was, we never came across it. Soon enough though, Amos began tracking and we were off the trail proper and deep into the woods. 

Jack-in-the-Pulpit berries

White Wood Aster

Blue Lobelia

Groundwort ("wart"), Thelophora vialis

Wrinkled Crust, Phelbia radiata

We came across old quarries cut into the hill where miners extracted iron ore, flint quartz, and ironstone. Scree slopes of waste rock flowed down the sides of the hill but the woods were thick reclaiming the rough ground, burying the scree with leaf litter and puctuating the quarry pits with grand old oaks, stately beech, and enormous tulip poplar. 

Braided bark of an older Tulip Poplar

Furrowed bark of an American Hornbeam

"Fingerbone" bark of a Mockernut Hickory

Checked bark of American Dogwood

Buck-rubbed bark of American Beech

The turtle tracking didn't take long. Amos stood at alert at a small female box turtle which was so well disguised in orange and black that even when I walked right up to Amos I had to wait a second or two to see it. She was maybe ten years old at most and rested, unfazed in the duff. I said "Good boy, Amos! You found a turtle!" while digging into my pack for some turkey jerkey to reward him. Oh the joy! So much joy that the little brave turtle let out a big hiss and fully closed up as Amos danced around her for his treat. 

Success! 

Box Turtle, Terrapene carolina

We returned to the Ironworks Trail and followed the crest of the hill towards even bigger quarry pits, cloaked in forest. Bathed in golden light, the forest seemed to shimmer all around us while some trees let loose a shiver of falling leaves, yellow and brown. Dead wood was speckled with tiny mushrooms, shelf fungus,and molds probably brought on by recent, much needed rains. A patch of Wrinkled Crust fungus was so bright orange I mistook it for flourescent orange spray paint.

Knoll above Deer Creek

Hard to spot the yellow blazes in a bright yellow green woods

Wild Ginger

This was the kind of early autumn day that sweeps your mind clean of all the stupid-hot days of the last month and makes you crave the autumn coolness even more. Still, there's a lot of green yet to contend with and it was practically glowing up from the ferns and wild ginger below to the ceiling of deep green of the creaking old oaks overhead with full canopies of lobed leaves.  

Basidia, spore openings, beneath Bracket Fungus. 

Seed bracts of the American Hornbeam, Carpinus caroliniana

Climbing up on a pile of dark basalt lavastone, Amos sniffed the air again, head held high in hopes of catching another turtle track. Knowing that what he really wanted was another turkey jerky treat, we sat together and shared a snack and some water. From our perch I could see the woods all the way around from knoll to valley  thinking, yeah, this is my element.  Amos kept his eye on the jerky bag, his element. 

Ironworks Trail

Leaving the forest for the meadow walk out, I had to look back to remind myself that the night before was a wild time in these woods - wind, torrential rain, lightening, deafing booms of thunder. And somewhere back there, a forest elder was lying sectioned up and blackened.  Back at the parking lot, the one lone firefighter was still leaning on his fire rake, assigned to monitor the site for the next few hours. He asked about the hike and I showed him the picture of the little female turtle and he said "Good boy, Amos!" at which point Amos began his happy dance for more turkey jerky. 

Notes: 

Palmer State Park, Harford County, Maryland State Parks.  

Palmer State Park, Harford Land Trust.