Sprouting acorns—who knew?

I’ve been stalling on this post for quite a while, wanting to give it special attention, because I was so struck by these. Couldn’t decide which images to use, in what order--real hand-wringing!

I was wandering around in the woods as usual, in mid-April, looking for things (mushrooms, if possible), and I noticed all these RED things on the ground, deep red spots all over the place. At first I just thought it was some leftover pieces of acorns, I don’t know, changing colors like a piece of fading fruit, until I got my face down closer, and found yet another whole new thing going on.

These look innocent enough, except for that startling red…

       

               
I don’t know what I thought about how acorns sprouted in the woods, but it certainly wasn’t this! I guess I thought a bunch of nice pale brown acorns fell, most were eaten, and a few sprouted like any other run-of-the-mill seed. What surprised me were the colors (many), and the shapes (as usual). Also, there were a lot of them. Every several inches there was another one! I took precisely one million pictures, then kicked myself later (only a little) for not taking more, and for not spending just a little more time getting better shots…tricky to get everything in focus with shoots up there and acorn down there…       



I wonder what those tiny white spots are (above). Nice touch!

Then I started to run into stuff like this:


Okay, here is when I began to realize things were getting a little out of hand. Which is the shoot and where is the root, and what are those sea-slug-like-like ruffles? And everything’s all tangled up and wild colors!



The wiggly red things are not the first leaves! They’re connected to the cotyledons. The shoot with the first true leaves is between the two flat wiggly things.

Why is everything red?



I actually had to stop and look at this for a while. If that’s the leaf/shoot sticking straight up, then what’s all that other stuff? I had to discuss it with a friend, who helped me untangle the structure.



This one (above) is waving one cotyledon in the air.

As near as I can figure, with acorns (at least this model) everything happens at once. Maybe since it’s got so much food available from the big fat nut meat (and it needs to move fast before someone eats it), it puts out a root and shoot with true leaves at the same time, ready to go, all the while taking sustenance from the big acorn nut (the cotyledon, which is like a placenta, really), so it’s all just *blam!*, get everything going all at once! It’s pretty much like any other seed sprouting, but the cotyledons are extra large, and they seem to not have to leave the shell for everything to work out.

The term “cotyledon” was coined by 17th-century physician Marcello Malphigi (“bad piggy”).

But, the operating words here are “as near as I can figure.” I don’t know any acorn experts yet.

A few more:



See, the shoot is already up, and those red arms are attached to the cotyledons, still in the shell.

Lastly:



Take that, Georgia O’Keeffe! Kids, go ask your parents what that means.

So you walk around thinking you have a basic idea of what’s going on out there, until you look closer. Well, good luck with that! Look where that got me.

Winter-spring shells

I am about 9 hikes behind on posts. Once I started to get out there, when winter let go, I couldn't stop, and the pictures kept building up, and here I am. Now I see I better get on it, as the woods are bursting with everything! There's no going back now. All the spring wildflowers were on cue, we're actually in the second wave of arrivals. So it's post now, or never get caught up.

We'll talk about morels in a few posts. Yes, they're up here, and yes, I (finally) found some. Haven't found the mother-lode or anything, but I'm finding them, and I actually do feel something like electricity when I spot them. Then I eat them.

The following several days I'll be putting up a series of posts covering the last 6 weeks or so, starting the minute I thought there might be signs of life out there.

A snail shell. I just read that there's 106 species of land snails in Missouri, so no ID from me here...named or not, it stood out nicely against the dead leaves, and when I got my face down on it, there was beauty. Looks good big.

An acorn with a perfectly-drilled hole in it. Faeries up to more nonsense. Why would they need to drill a hole in an acorn?

A sloppy little snail, one of the first forest-floor citizens I saw this spring. I was honored.

Extra-fancy striped acorn on a soft bed of spring moss and lichen.

Ever-marvelous Trametes versicolor, Turkey Tail mushroom--this one in an unusual ribbon-like growth pattern. Fresh, supple new growth. A very happy sign even though the day was cool and the sky was dark and low.