I was able to combine business and pleasure yesterday (July 1st)… Well, It was really all business and a complete pleasure! I had heard of a bog near Cable, Wisconsin that held many Calopogon tuberosus orchids (Swamp-Pink or Grass-Pink) and I was hoping to get video of their ingenious and devious pollination method (read more below).
This particular peatland is actually classified as a fen. What is the difference between a bog and a fen? Bogs are usually stagnant water with very acidic waters. Fens have some water movement and are more basic in pH and richer in nutrients.
Calopogon tuberosus (Swamp-Pink or Grass-Pink orchid) is a delightful mid summer orchid that grows in the floating mat of bogs and fens. Its flowers are “upside down” as the lip is actually on top. The insect-enticing yellow hairs are just a ruse…They fool insects into thinking that they are pollen-tipped or hold nectar, neither of which is true. If a heavy enough bee comes along, it gloms on to the yellow-tipped hairs and tries to extract some pollen. The flower has a built in hinge that collapses and drops the bee on to the sticky pollen packets below. The startled and frustrated bee flies off to try his luck at another Calopogon, and the scenario is repeated, though this time pollination is completed. Devious and Delightful orchid!

Note that on the middle right flower the hinge has already been collapsed by a visiting bee. Though I got video of several small syrphid flies visiting the orchid, none heavy enough to collapse the hinge paid a visit with my camera rolling. Oh well, a reason to go back!
Believe me, I was shin deep in water and sinking fast as I took this image. This is an example of a “flag” spruce… A growth form that is very common in the subarctic lands. The “flag” is the upper branches while the nonexistent middle branches were scoured by winter winds and failed to thrive. The sprawling mass of branches low down on the trunk survived because they were protected by deep blanket of winter snow.

Elfin Skimmer male (Nannothemis bella)
A wonderful surprise! Just days after Jim Lind and Dave Grosshuesch found many Elfin Skimmers at the Sax-Zim Bog BioBlitz III (a new species for Sax-Zim!) I got my lifer dragonfly! This is the smallest dragonfly in North America at a tad over 3/4 inch long…and the second smallest in the World (one in China is a bit smaller). The male is pruinose bluish and almost appears to have a clubbed abdomen when in flight.
Female Elfin Skimmers (Nannothemis bella) are very different than the males. They show a ringed black and yellow abdomen. Both the males and females perch often and only move a short distance when disturbed. These were found hunting around a bog pool mainly on the floating mat.
Another orchid was just coming into bloom… the Rose Pogonia (Pogonia ophioglossoides) a delicate beauty of floating bogs. Genus name Ophioglossoides is from Greek meaning “snake tongue,” and I guess you’d have to use your imagination on that one, but the lower lip may resemble a fuzzy tongue to some.
A very exciting find was not one, but two singing Okanagana Cicadas. The male of each species produces a unique sound with their tymbal organs on their abdomen which vibrates and resonates in a cavity inside their abdomen and thorax. The Okanagana’s sound is a fast and steady high-pitched buzz.
Crimson-ringed Whiteface (Leucorrhinia glacialis) is a bog-loving dragonfly of mid summer.
Lincoln’s Sparrow was the most obvious avian bog dweller today, singing its beautiful hollow-can, echoey song from stunted Tamaracks and Spruces. Other birds seen in the bog included Nashville Warbler, Eastern Bluebird, Red-tailed Hawk and Eastern Kingbird. The oak-maple covered hills surrounding the fen held Pileated Woodpeckers, Scarlet Tanagers, Ovenbirds, Red-bellied Woodpeckers, Eastern Wood-Pewees and other deciduous species that would have no use for a bog.
Rhynchospora alba or White Beakrush (or White-beaked Sedge) was very common surrounding the bog pools.
Is there a lovelier leaf in the world? Yes, the “pitcher” of the carnivorous Pitcher Plant (Sarracenia purpurea) is actually a modified leaf. Inside a deadly mixture of rain water and enzymes can drown and dissolve the unwary insect. The plant is able to absorb important nutrients such as Phosphorous from the tiny carcasses with special cells low inside the pitcher. Good thing these guys aren’t six feet across!
One more carnivorous plant was super-abundant at this fen, Horned Bladderwort (Utricularia cornuta). The related Common Bladderwort is a predator that has dozens of tiny bladders on its underwater leaves. The hair-triggers on the bladders are set off when a tiny aquatic insect blunders by and sucked in to the bladder in a rush of water. The bladder now becomes a tiny stomach and the insect is dissolved by the plant.
Mystery sedge/rush.
If you do swing through Cable, Wisconsin, be sure to stop at their impressive Cable Natural History Museum. Among other treasures, they have an actual stuffed Passenger Pigeon! More info at http://www.cablemuseum.org