Decided to go on a walk through the woods in East Woods Natural Area today.  A stroll down to the banks of the quiet stream that flows through the area revealed an abundance of fiddleheads poking their curious, curled fronds out of the leaf litter to bask in the warmth of the sun!  Fiddleheads can be good spring eating but if harvesting them make sure to leave at least half of the tops so that you don't kill plant.  That way you can sustainably harvest these delicious spring edibles year after year.  A little further into the forest I came across a large, prone, dead paper birch (Betula papyrifera) in a late stage of decomposition and found a nice bit of chaga (Inonotus obliquus) still clinging to the tree.  I became very excited as this was the first time I had seen Chaga growing in the Lake Champlain Valley but since it was growing on a dead birch I did not harvest it.  I have heard that if one intends on consuming it, he or she should harvest chaga only from living trees.  Still no morels, not enough rain and still very early in the spring but I'm keeping my eyes peeled. 

Green is the color of spring!

Good looking fiddleheads have nice curls (personal opinion).

Fungi residing on a downed branch.

Chaga (inonotus obliquus)!

The golden inside of chaga.

Polypores growing on the thickly furrowed bark of an oak.

A non-edible fiddlehead species glowing in the sunlight by the stream.

A health turkey tail (Trametes versicolor) colony on a dying beech (Fagus grandifolia)

As Spring has progressed, I have been able to observe a whole host of different plant, tree, and fern specimens in different stages of bloom.  The Spring wildflowers were particularly beautiful during our mid-April jaunt in Niquette Bay State Park.

Trout Lily (Erythronium americanum) in Full Bloom

Beautiful colors of Hepatica

Sulphur Yellow buds of the Bitternut Hickory (Carya cordiformis)!

Ginger Growing Wild

Bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis)

Red Trillium; Stinking Benjamin (Trillium erectum)

Dutchman's breeches (Dicentra cucullaria)

Where bloodroot gets its name from.

Sessile bellwort; wild oats (Uvularia sessilifolia)

Large-flower trillium (Trillium grandiflorum)

Common blue violet (Viola sororia)

Early meadow-rue (Thalictrum dioicum)

Flowering bloodroot.

Yellow-spotted Salamander (Pseudohynobius flavomaculatus)

White birch (Betula papyrifera) 'bleeding' sap 

Unidentified mushroom still standing from the previous year.

Black bears leaving their mark on this American beech (Fagus grandifolia).