[asukawashere]

So, my family's taking this crazy 10-14 day road trip in like 2 weeks to deposit my sister and her accumulated crud in Tennessee so she can go to college there. (This is, of course, assuming that my various siblings and I do not commit mutual homicide along the way, seeing as being locked in a car with one's siblings for untold hours tends to result in such inclinations.)

Anyway, that's not my point. My point is that I'm going to be visiting weird places on the way to Tennessee, with possible stopovers in Ohio and/or the Carolinas and/or who knows where else, and I kind of want to go ditch collecting along the way, but don't want to deal with carrying around specimens for the whole trip, nor do I suspect they'd be in great shape after a week or two of sitting in buckets in a hot car.

So, I'm toying with the idea of bringing a few priority flat-rates with me, and mailing any plants I find back home to a club member along the way. (This is, of course, assuming I find anything worthwhile). Would anyone be interested in receiving them for me? I only ask that you try to keep them all alive as best as you can until I get back home and can pick them up, and you can keep a portion of the stems/plants of any specimens that you like in return

So, anyone willing to give it a shot?

 

[khanzer22]

If you can find some eriocaulon spp, I wouldn't mind taking care of them for you

 

[Riverboa]

I don't mind holding them - let me know.

 

[asukawashere]

Khanzer, if I manage to stumble across an erio of some sort, I'll be sure to try and grab it for you.
That said, erios are not my specialty and I probably wouldn't be able to recognize one even if it slapped me in the face while screaming for all the world to hear that it is, indeed, an Eriocaulon But I'll try.

Riverboa, thanks for volunteering. I'll contact you with details once we flesh out the details of our trip, probably towards the end of the week - fascinatingly, none of us seem to know where we're going, or what we're doing, or for how long, or where we're stopping, and so on. We just know we're taking off on the 17th or so and coming back after we deposit my sister in Nashville for the semester. And I, of course, know that I'm going to do everything in my power to raid at least one muddy ditch along the way. Because it totally wouldn't be a vacation for me, otherwise.

 

[asukawashere]

Riverboa, can you PM me your mailing address, please? I'm still not sure if I'll find any worthwhile plants, but I'm bringing the boxes just in case I'll try and send you a PM along the way (assuming I can find internet access) and let you know if I end up sending something out.

Thanks!

 

[Gordonrichards]

Find me a baseball or two of fissidens fontanus please! I want to fill a 10 gallon tank. :^)

 

[asukawashere]

Hi all,

I'm writing from the road in Albemarle Plantation, NC. Last week we drove westward over to Akron, OH, then down south to Lexington, KY, and through to Nashville, TN (where we deposited my sister at Vanderbilt U and almost got struck by lightning - long story). Haven't found much so far - apparently, OH and TN are devoid of good ditches to collect 'round, but I did pick up a couple stems of Ludwigia peploides over in KY. Also found a cool terrestrial ground cover in TN, but that's of no interest to you guys, now, is it?

Anyway, I'm planning to go raid Albemarle Sound's shores for cool aquatics today. There's a little pond/ditch thing in front of the condo unit we're staying at that's got some sort of floaty stem in it - looks to be some sort of Potamogeton, but I can't say for sure. The ditch in question is also overflowing with Gambusia affinis (Eastern Mosquitofish) - I'm contemplating looking for an area LFS to get a net and some bags to bring some home. Anybody want some if I do??

Ludwigia peploides in KY:

 

[khanzer22]

Nice pic Asuka... Lotsa duckweeds too!

 

[asukawashere]

Thanks, khanzer!

Speaking of duckweeds, I found some Spirodela polyrhiza (Giant duckweed) during this morning's explorations It's kind of cool, much bigger than the common duckweed (Lemna minor) we see all the time, and with neat pinkish-reddish undersides to it's leaves (which are about the size of pencil erasers)... also came across some Najas guadalupensis (which I'm not going to bother harvesting b/c I have tons back home) and some more Ludwigia... plus a bunch of marginals (tons of pickerel rush/Pontederia cordata) and stuff... possibly one or two other stems that I'll squint at some more tomorrow...

I'll post some more pictures whenever I get around to uploading them

 

[asukawashere]

And the latest updates:

I found a few more plants - some Hydrocotyle (either umbellata or verticillata, methinks) and a stem of something that looks to be Ceratophyllum or similar. Also found a wad of... something. Maybe Potamogeton, or a related stemmy thing. Saw some Saururus cernuus, too, but haven't yet grabbed some to take home - planning to grab it tomorrow, though

I went looking for Echinodorus cordifolius, just in case, but didn't find any. Since this is the northern part of their territory, I'm not surprised, but it'd have been nice to snag a few. There are, however, a bunch of other Alismataceae species here, and I grabbed a strange-looking large Sagittaria specimen of unknown species for my pond.

Got my hands on a baitfishing net and went fishing for little scaly things. Aside from the plethora of Gambusia affinis, I netted out four juvie banded sunfish (Enneacanthus obesus) and something that looks like it might be a banded killifish (Fundulus diaphanus). Cute little bugger, whatever it is.

I also caught a Blue Crab, but let him go - too small to eat, too big and crabby to keep with my fish Since there are crab traps at the dock that they let people use for free here, I might end up going crabbing with my crazy family sooner or later

Planning to catch some 'skeeterfish tomorrow morning, then hit the road and come home with lots of goodies

 

[asukawashere]

Yay, more photos:

My sister took this photo when I asked her to hold my camera so I could poke around the water's edge. Yep, here I am, looking like the world's biggest dork, hunching over plant growth by a pond wearing shorts and boots.

A bitty baby snapping turtle that I found at the edge of a swampy area. Isn't he cute?

This? Just a little slice of ditch-hunting paradise!

Yay more swampy pond edges!

This alarmingly tame piebald pigeon happily took bread crusts straight from my hand ' This was at lunch in Asheville, NC, on our way to Albemarle Plantation.

Pretty DOUBLE rainbow we saw from our hotel room in Nashville, TN (the 2nd rainbow is fainter and above the clearer one). 20 minutes or so later, we went driving toward Vanderbilt U and lightning struck a highway sign not 100 yards from our car - sending everyone on the road into utter panic, naturally. Actually, I thought it was pretty cool.

A hideous, plant-devouring pest organism in downtown Nashville :mrgreen:

Floaty plant stuff. Potamogeton sp., probably.