Perseverance

Pine hyacinth - Clematis baldwinii

 A few days ago, my partner Jane Mussey and I set out to Colt Creek State Park to explore a bit and specifically look for Calopogon orchids that I had heard were blooming there following a prescribed fire. The Park is not far from our home and I had never visited it so I was especially interested to see what it held in terms of natural history.  Calopogon orchids of all types respond to fire. Most of the time, they make their appearance within several weeks of a burn and then disappear from all but the best trained eyes until the next one.  The time was right to look for them and I knew that it was either now or never.

We arrived knowing nothing about the burn's location. I figured that it would be fairly noticeable at some distance from the main drive so it seemed an easy task as we entered the Park. As we paid our entrance fee and picked up a Park map, I asked the employee at the gate house if she could tell us where on the map the burn had been conducted. She had no idea... We drove the entire road circuit in the Park and there was no evidence of a prescribed fire and no other employee to be found. This was my first real inkling that this day was not to be as easy as I first thought. Just as I was about ready to just wing it, and pick a trail to walk down at random, a Park Ranger in a golf cart came down the road, headed towards us and I waved him down. He had not been to the site to see where the orchids might be, but he at least could outline on my map where the burn had occurred.  

With our new knowledge, Jane and I set out to the far corner of the Park to find the burn unit. Being mid-May, there were no clouds in the sky to shade us from the sun's intensity and the temperature was in the high 80's F. A 30-minute hike down the main hiking trail eventually took us to the right pineland and we then walked more slowly looking for anything pink out across the mostly charred landscape - weaving off the trail periodically to the inner edges of the burned unit.  The staff had obviously been able to burn several hundred acres and the area was extensive. Each time we came to a fork in the trail, we made a decision to go to the next one before quitting. Truth be told, we were tiring fast and with each trail fork, we became more discouraged. The only pink we kept finding were the meadow pinks blooming along the edge where the burn had not penetrated.  

At the final fork, we encountered a beautiful stand of pine hyacinths and stopped to take some photos. At least we had something extra special to photograph here, but they weren't the target and we still felt a bit disappointed because of that.  In this location, the fire had burned rather deep into a small cypress dome and the blackened knees and scant greenery made an interesting picture also. Jane stopped to rest on a log and waited for me while I walked the 40 yards to the dome. We had given up finding the orchids, and were resigned to the fact. It simply had been a good day to get outdoors and explore an unfamiliar park.  

As I often do, I made my way back to Jane in a somewhat circuitous route through the recently burned pine forest and as I approached her from a new angle, I spied the orchids. Standing no more than 8 inches, they had not been visible from where Jane sat and we would have completely missed them if we had walked back to the trail the way we first left it. Serendipity and another life lesson in the value of perseverance.

Many-flowered grass pink - Calopogon multiflorus

Creating a living landscape requires a great deal of perseverance too. It is not for the faint of heart nor for one with a predilection for giving up in the face of failure. There always will be failures - plants that die for seemingly no reason, plants that do too well and overshadow the others in a mixed bed, weather events that wreak havoc, neighbors that don't understand what you're trying to accomplish, and things like pest control that waft into our landscapes with dramatic consequences. I'm often asked if these kinds of things are too serious to overcome. Perhaps we shouldn't even embark  on such a journey if we are somehow luring wildlife into a situation that is either dangerous or ultimately lethal. It is my belief, however, that doing nothing or resigning ourselves to inaction is the worst path yet. Life on all accounts is a risk and being persistent is the only antidote I know of.

My landscape continues to develop. I've lost species of wildflowers in my meadow and a couple of the woody plants in the backyard. I have far more birds, bees and butterflies than I did at the beginning, but a great many more things are still alluding me. They will take time if I am persistent or they may never occur here. If I succeed in all or most of my goals, it will largely be due to that perseverance.  I am not a very patient man, so that is the thing that will carry me and this project through. Never give up - the thing that is alluding you may simply be right around the corner if you push ahead or at your feet awaiting notice.