Somewhat More Than a Trickle

Monday, March 11, 2013

Salado Creek Greenway, Oakwell Trailhead downstream

Today's photos:

The primary reason I walked this section of the Salado Creek Greenway today was to see how much, if any, water was flowing in the creek following Saturday night's rain. As can be seen in the series of photos of the Great Egret, the water in the creek isn't particularly deep, but there is something of a substantial flow remaining about a day and a half after the rain.

I have only included two photos of the Dewberry flowers here, but that isn't a fair representation of how abundant dewberry is in the ground cover along this section of the creek. I had noticed some patches of dewberry here on previous walks, but now that it is blooming, it is obvious the dewberry is one of the more prevalent plants. There are white dewberry flowers everywhere along the creek right now.

• The first two photos are the Dewberry flowers. There is a Honey Bee on one of the flowers in the first photo. The honey bees were almost as abundant as the flowers. Dewberry is in the Rose Family. The thorns (more correctly referred to as prickles) can be seen on the stems below the flowers in the first photo.
• The third photo is Baby Blue-eyes. They are one of the most common wildflowers blooming here right now.
• The fourth through ninth photos are a Great Egret that has been attracted to the creek by the flowing water.
• The tenth photo is a Phaon Crescent butterfly.