As I mentioned in the first post, my sister Joanne and I have developed a tradition of going out to St. Francois every spring in early April. (Our parents would come, too, but they have developed a tradition of going on a long train trip to Texas at around the same time each year!) We always drive down by the river, then go to the campground and hike the trail to the bluebells. We drive back to the picnic area at Coonville Creek, eat lunch by the creek, and then take our second hike, along a section of Mooner's Hollow trail.
This is where we see our second set of wildflowers - some of them are in both areas, but this is drier terrain, going up into the rockier ridges above the creek. A different ecological zone, where different plants grow.
There were a lot of dogtooth violets growing near the creek on the other side. Another name for that flower is "trout lily" - just like the ones I saw in Michigan last year, but white instead of yellow!
I spotted some toothwort but couldn't think of what it was called until Joanne saw some much later in the hike.
This looks like it might be spicebush, but there was no fragrance at all, so I'm pretty sure it's a lookalike. Still, some nice color in a forest that is still pretty bare!
This tree is not going anywhere. Look at those roots!
Several sections of the trail are basically following an old creek bed. Which is still a creek bed when there's enough rain. This is not easy terrain to walk on! First rule of hiking: don't look away from your feet when the trail looks like this!
If you do spot something, STOP and then take pictures! For instance, here's a lovely clump of bellwort.
There are a lot of ironwood trees along this stretch of the river. They have a very distinctive look, with a rippled surface that makes them look like they've got big, ripped muscles. Which they kind of do - these trees are tough. Even the littlest saplings will barely move when you shake them; the big ones feel solid as a rock. I spotted one that had fallen over, and the bark had started falling off, and I couldn't even break off the end of a branch that was less than an inch thick. They don't get very big, but they make up for it!
Starting to climb here - rocky ledges above, creek below. This trail goes back and forth between the two areas.
Looking down, we see a calm, clear section of the creek... a large sheet of bedrock with gravel on one side... and on the far side, trees that have been buried in quite a lot of gravel during a flood at one point, but seem to be doing just fine. No fish, although we did see minnows in a few spots.
One year we were up above, looking down, and saw a snake swimming across the surface of the water! It was really something!
One of our main stopping points is at a sunny hillside where birds-foot violets grow right next to the trail.
Somewhere along here we heard a rustle, stopped, and got a very short glimpse of a very tiny lizard! He was frozen for just a second, and then he was gone under the leaves. He couldn't have been even three inches long, and proportionately skinny. Very cute!
Along here is also where we started seeing rue anemone. No false rue anemone along here - it's too dry and rocky.
Wild geranium! It's a pale pink, but that got a bit washed out here.
Buttercups! Common enough in many yards, but still a bright spot of color!
Here we begin to descend toward the creek again. I took one photo looking down along the path ahead... That's a dogwood tree there, just starting to open so still looking a bit yellowish, not bright white yet.
And one facing up the hill in the opposite direction.
Right where the trail turns to go into that clump of cedars, there are just a couple of celandine poppies.
A short side trail leads to the creek, across from a stone ledge with water dripping down. This time we noticed a bird flying out from underneath - a swallow was building its nest under there! They build their nests out of mud that they stick to the walls of cliffs (or barns, or bridges...) He's got a good protected spot, there!
Here's the view upstream.
The cedars have such dense shade, we were able to find a bloodroot that was still blooming! The ones in the lighter part of the woods were all finished!
We also spotted some hepatica. We'd seen some on the rocks earlier - it was just finishing blooming also. But where we usually see white flowers, the ones here were pale lavender!
We did see some plain white hepatica, too.
Joanne kept getting ahead of me when I stopped to take pictures. That used to be me, running ahead while our dad was stopped to take pictures! I just love this view, with the creek on one side and the rocks climbing up out of view on the other.
Usually we go further along the trail, up to a small open glade. Later in the spring and summer there would be paintbrush and other unique flowers blooming there, but this early there's less to see. Still, we would have gone up there - except I managed to hook my foot around a log step I was trying to step over, and swung forward to bang my knee into the ground. Remarkably, it wasn't hurt too badly, but I wanted to get back to the car before it started hurting worse - and we still hadn't gotten to the longer climbs of the trail. So our second hike got cut a bit short - but it was still a beautiful walk!
Redbuds across the road from the picnic area, on our way out.
redbud tree
dogwood tree
bird's-foot violet
puccoon
verbena
sweet William
mayapples (leaves, not flowers)
spring beauties
dandelions
purple violets
boxelder tree
yellow violets
white violets
wild crabapple tree
trillium
BLUEBELLS!!!
pawpaw tree (green)
false rue anemone
buckeye tree
Johnny jump-up
spicebush look-alike
bellwort
dogtooth violet AKA trout lily
toothwort
buttercup
wild geranium
rue anemone
celandine poppy
bloodroot
hepatica
purple hepatica!
And one lone little clump of grape hyacinth growing near the creek in the picnic area, wondering what in the world it's doing out there in the woods.
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