Members' Hike - AEDC and May Prairie wildflower walk Members Only
Members Only Family-Friendly Registration Required Free Event Group Tour Nature Walk/Hike Lots of Physical Activity
Join us on a hike led by Dennis Horn, TNPS Charter member/Author/Naturalist and botanical guru. He will be our hike guide and lead us through middle Tennessee's Barrens ecosystem for grassland species at the Arnold Engineering Development Center and at May Prairie. Dennis is co-author of “Wildflowers of Tennessee,” and you can bring your copy for an autograph or purchase an updated edition at the hike.
First walk along with us roadside and into the large power line cut at Arnold Engineering Development Center (AEDC) to see slender blue Iris (Iris prismatica), cinnamon fern (Osmundastrum cinnamomeum), native orchids: tuberous grasspink (Calopogon tuberosus), spreading pogonia (Cleistesiopsis bifaria), and possibly ragged fringed orchid (Platanthera lacera) and rose pogonia (Pogonia ophioglossoides). We should also find early blooms of death camas (previously known as Zigadenus leimanthoides, now Stenanthium tennesseense).
Then on to May Prairie for examples of TN rare plants that are disjunct from the Gulf Coastal Plain and the prairies of the Midwest, with more than 300 species, 25 of which are rare in Tennessee. View blooms of paintbrush (Castilleja coccinea), marsh pea (Lathyrus palustris), early blooms of horned bladderpod (Utricularia cornuta), and swamp candles (Lysimachia terrestris), three eryngo species (Eryngium prostratum and possible early flowering Eryngium mississippiense, formerly E. integrifolium, plus vegetative Eryngium yuccifolium) and many more.
Easy walking and not to be missed. Sign up for further details!
Registration now open!