This morning I am reminded of how little I yet have learned, how much there still is to learn. Providing background information of my natural subjects is one of my strategies to mark my passion for nature’s wonders as contagious. Today, the best I can hope for is to instill you with a sense of awe; specifically an awe in the multiplicity of Sedges. If that’s too ambitious of me, please just enjoy the pictures I share!

Caricology is the study of this large species, Sedge (carex). The identification of the sedges in these images remains a mystery to me. I’m content to know that I still haven’t learned it all; actually I’m excited to know I’m not done exploring life’s mysteries.

The Sedges alongside the riverbank were expected natives. Connecting this river with the forest through which it flowed brought together two moist loving species that do not usually mingle with each other. My eye focused on a colony of Mayapples (Podophyllum). Mayapples are woodland natives that stir folktale imaginations in my mind with each springtime encounter. Here they were sharing the forest floor with Sedges. Crouching down as I hunted for yet-to-bloom Mayapple flowers I quickly became fascinated by the stringy fuzz of these Sedges.

Mayapples and Sedges communing together. Copyright 2015 Pamela Breitberg

Sedges among the Mayapple. Copyright 2015 Pamela Breitberg

Sedge in Cook County Forest Preserve, Chicago. Copyright 2015 Pamela Breitberg

-Read other Mayapple posts of mine:

• “May in April…”, April 2012
  
• “Shy beauty…”, May 2013
  

-Illinois is host to over 200 “Sedges, grasses and non-flowering plants”: http://www.illinoiswildflowers.info/grasses/grass_index.htm .