Stewardship Update: Spring Showers, Flood Pools and bring May Flowers

Vernal ponds are the coral reefs of the forest… critical, disconnected, temporary and unfortunately unprotected habitats that provide vital habitat for unique fauna that fully depend on them!. Because of their temporary, isolated nature, fish cannot live in these wetlands, allowing them to provide safe havens for obligate species such as salamanders, fairy shrimp, endangered turtles, and wood frogs to eat, breed, and flourish. Walking into a forest or oak savannah on a moist, warm, low wind night, makes this abundance clear, the vibration of frog calls clearly delineating these keystone, spring wildlife hotspots. The bugs that proliferate in these vernal ponds form an insect buffet for songbirds, bats, and frogs. Mammals benefit from access to water. Beyond animal life, they capture run off, sink water, clean water, prevent flooding, and breakdown forest litter helping cycle nutrients. 

As important as they are, vernal ponds are not protected by law because of their ephemeral nature; small, often less than 1 acre, temporary, dry by summer, and isolated from other bodies of water.. they fall short of definitions of wetlands for state and federal protection. 
In one of the less notorious, yet on-going devastating acts of Trump’s first administration, he gutted the Clean Water Act by narrowing the definition of "Waters of the United States,” reducing protections to wetlands to those that maintain  regular surface water connection to a "relatively permanent" body of water, such as a river or lake. Federal protections have been weakened.

While Michigan is one of the few states with its own authority to manage wetlands habitat (act 451 Part 303), the state mostly regulates wetlands larger than 5 acres. For smaller wetlands to be protected, they must be “contiguous" to a Great Lake, inland lake, pond, river, or stream. This usually means being within 500 feet of an inland water body or 1,000 feet of a Great Lake. Part 303 does protect “rare and imperiled" wetland types, but vernal pools are not currently explicitly listed under this category. They should be! 

A flood of development, from weakening federal protections, and lack of state support threaten our unprotected vernal ponds. But one network has been mapping and documenting vernal ponds, gathering data that could be used to save them in the future:  the Michigan Vernal Pools Partnership (MVPP) by Michigan Natural Features Inventory. Both of our staff here at Rouge Park, Noor and Antonio, have been trained under the MVPP, as well as Sally before us. We are monitoring these ponds in Rouge Park and building out ways for more youth and the general public to participate in that.

Our Vernal Ponds are safe from development, not even Trump can touch them, but they face another threat: CSO-flood waters. As I have covered in previous articles, the Rouge Watershed is 80% developed, there are so few wetlands that our park floods very regularly.. That floodwater far too often includes human waste water because of the Combined Sewer Overflow systems that combine rain water from roofs and streets with toilet waste water underground, which is fine so long as you don’t have heavy downpours regularly.. as we do these days. These flood waters can introduce untreated sewage, negative pathogens, nutrients and toxins. This can plummet water oxygen levels, introduce invasive species, even fish that disrupt habitat, making the place unsuitable for more sensitive amphibians. Ultimately this reduces the quality of the pond! But nature persists.

In fact we had to cancel our Vernal Pond exploration activity on April 18th because of this exact reason. Luckily in the days prior, we hosted St Suzanne’s youth checking at the vernal pond north of Tireman and Spinoza.  We did find fairy shrimp which was super cool! Most importantly, local youth got a chance to use microscopes and dig into some citizen science. I noticed the prior week’s rains flooded the river, which began flowing into the pond. Hopefully flood waters didn’t negatively impact those fairy shrimp!

Luckily we have a number of vernal pools in Rouge Park with different elevations. South of that pond, just north of Warren road, on the east side of the river, the vernal pond that I have known for the last 4 years was empty most of spring, but those same rains that flooded Tireman vernal pond filled up the southernmost vernal pond in Rouge Park.
Spring Ephemeral Flowers
April showers bring us May flowers…. the spring ephemerals are fully in bloom! Ephemeral comes from the greek word ephemerus-meaning lasting a day or a short period of time. This early spring season is so special, before the trees fully leaf-out the forest floor comes alive with the tiny, short lived flowers, many of which move through their entire life cycle sprouting, flowering, pollinating and setting seed as the canopy above them fills out. 

Mutual benefits: A solid 40% of these ephemeral flowers count on ants to spread their seed, by producing seeds with fatty deposits on them, called elaiosomes, rich in lipids, proteins, and carbohydrates, which act as a high-energy food source for ants and their larva.  Ants to collect them, eat the fatty part and deposit seeds in ant-dumps called middens where those seeds can safely germinate into more flowers!
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The following are spring ephemerals I have personally encountered in Rouge Park with some interested facts about each. Please note that while some are edible, we request people refrain from harvesting in Rouge Park as we don't want to lose the population we are trying to preserve through unintentional overharvest.  
Spring Beauties (Claytonia virginica) are edible, and they range from white to pink. Pink flowers are more likely to be eaten but also more likely to attract pollinators. 
Blood Root (Sanguinaria canadensis) Purportedly, the red sap from the roots, from which it gets its name, was used as a natural dye and face paint by some Native American tribes. Modern science has found that it is toxic, causing irritation, burning, inflammation, and tissue death, forming thick, dark, scabby tissue. **Rare due to deer pressure. 
Dutchman’s Breeches (Dicentra cucullaria) Also toxic, the flowers lack fragrance are primarily pollinated by bumble bees, one of few insects big and strong enough to enter the flower. **Rare in Rouge due to deer pressure. 
Cut-leaf Toothwort (Cardamine concatenata) Pungent edible brassica, connected via rhizomatous roots which are  spicy, giving the plant the name "pepper root.” There were historically used as medicine, food, and even as an indigenous "love medicine" by the Haudenosaunee peoples. 
Spring Cress (Cardamine bulbosa) same edible brassica family, lots of vitamin C, and a spicy, horseradish-like
Rue Anemone (Thalictrum thalictroides) buttercup family, produces pollen and not nectar. 
Meadow Rue (thalictrum dioscorides) Wind pollinated, with weird dangling pollen sacks and petal-less flowers. 
Blue Cohosh (Caulophyllum thalictroides) Cohosh" comes from Algonquin for "rough," referring to the rhizome. Purportedly used by Native Americans for aiding childbirth (uterine stimulant), promoting menstruation, and as an anti-inflammatory. However modern medicine considers it toxic. 
Trout Lily (Yellow: Erythronium americanum, White: Erythronium albidum) Edible, Natives used for fever, wounds, and contraceptive, anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, and wound-healing properties. Eating in large quantities can cause vomiting. Only 10% are successfully pollinated, more spread asexually from bulblets that fall off the main corm. It takes 4-7 years to flower.. grows in colonies, some aging thousands of years old, age is measured by the size of their colonies. 
Wild ginger (Asarum canadense) Alleged that native used roots for flavoring, which smells like ginger but is NOT related. Modern science says consuming this is a bad idea, cause of toxic compounds in the plant. 
Yellow bell wart (Uvularia grandiflora) droopy aesthetic has earned it nicknames like "sad bells”. These guys can be big, as seen in the scientific name grand, but they tend to stay small and sad due to deer pressure. 
Trillium (Trillium spp) Can take up to 10 years to bloom from seed, these are ***decimated by deer because they are highly nutritious and apparently delicious, popping up in early spring. 
Jack in the pulpit (arisaema triphyllum) The trans-plants can change sex from male to female depending on environmental conditions and age. Pollinated by a fungus gnat, lured by the musty smell of fungi, they get stuck, hitting the central spadex as they try to fly away. 
Virginia Waterleaf (Hydrophyllum virginianum) The lighter, watery patches on the leaves, most prominent on young in spring, fade away, turning solid green as the summer progresses.
May apple (Podophyllum peltatum) Rhizomatus so they grow together in colonies. Produce a fruit in late summer (not may) that is said to taste like a mix of pineapple, mango, and passion fruit. While the rest of the plant is toxic, the roots contain a compound used by  the pharmaceutical industry to fight virus and cancer.  Two leaves means flowers and fruits. 
Wild geraniums (Geranium Maculatum) Geranium = from Greek geranos (crane), referencing the long beak-like fruit, which explode once dried and ready, shooting the seeds up to 30 feet away, on a form of Ballochory (or ballistic seed dispersal). 
False lily of the valley (Maianthemum canadense) Like the mayapple one leaf means no flowers, and 2 leaves means flowers and fruit will come. **Rare due to deer pressure. 
The southern section of Rouge Park is an older growth forest, easily one of Detroit’s most intact natural areas; the giant trees, the abundance of spring ephemeral flowers and vernal pond…  all very clear signs of old growth forest. But the forest could use a bit more tender love and care, in the form of invasive species control, deer management and controlled burns. I’ll talk more about the Southern Section of Rouge Park and these vital management changes next month!