A Far-Away Meadow at Kashner Corners Swamp
Kashner Corners Swamp, located in the headwaters of Otter Creek, was recognized in WPC's Mercer County Natural Heritage Inventory as a notable Biological Diversity Area (BDA) – an area with unique natural diversity. Two natural communities, a wet meadow and a bottomland oak-hardwood palustrine forest, were recognized at this site. Today's picture, by WPC's Ecologist Robert Coxe, is of the wet meadow. These meadows are fairly common in Mercer County, Pa., along headwaters of streams and in floodplains. In the picture, you can identify some of the plant species in the meadow. In the foreground with the whitish-yellow spikes is reed canary grass (Phalaris arundinacea), a rather invasive plant which unfortunately can outcompete natives like the pink floweredswamp milkweed ( Asclepias incarnata ) visible here. The darker green grass in the middle of the picture is rice-cut grass (Leersia virginica). In the background around the standing dead trees and darker green leaves is wide-leaved cattail (Typha latifolia).
The bottomland oak-hardwood palustrine forest is located upstream of the meadow beyond the view of the picture. Prominent trees in this community include swamp white oak (Quercus bicolor), black ash (Fraxinus nigra) and red maple
(Acer rubrum). Underneath these trees in the understory are spicebush (Lindera benzion) and American hornbeam (Carpinus caroliniana). Common herbs in this forest are clearweed (Pilea pumila), cinnamon fern (Osmunda cinnamomea), great blue lobelia (Lobelia siphilitica) and common boneset (Eupatorium perfoliatum).
| There's a place called Far-away Meadow
We never shall mow in again,
Or such is the talk at the farmhouse:
The meadow is finished with men.
Then now is the chance for the flowers
That can't stand mowers and plowers.
It must be now, through, in season
Before the not mowing brings trees on,
Before trees, seeing the opening,
March into a shadowy claim.
The trees are all I'm afraid of,
That flowers can't bloom in the shade of;
It's no more men I'm afraid of;
The meadow is done with the tame.
The place for the moment is ours
For you, oh tumultuous flowers,
To go to waste and go wild in,
All shapes and colors of flowers,
I needn't call you by name.
The Last Mowing
By Robert Frost
Published/Written in 1928
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