Pokemon Go, Every Plant Ever, and Fifth Orchid Sydrome- Cowles Bog Trail

Many of my friends have recently started playing Pokemon Go, which is an augmented reality game.  For those who don't understand what this means, it involves traveling around the real world with your smartphone out, and you look at the world through your smartphone.  In certain areas,  you encounter Pokemon (if you don't know what those are, they are essentially weird video game creatures based off Japanese mythology).  As a result, the world has lately been host to a number of bizarre incidents, including robbers targeting Pokemon Go players.

However, the main appeal to me has been watching my non-naturalist friends turn into me on a hike.  "Ooh, a Charmander over here!"  Substitute Charmander for Carolina Wren or Michigan Lily, and the similarity is apparent.  Birding and botanizing, however, have the advantage of not running on batteries, since they exist in the "real" world.

After all, we birders and/or botanists invented this madness that is running around trying to find as many Pokemon/birds/plants as we can.  I recently read about a man who was driving along, and his wife asked him to stop.  When he asked why, she responded that there was a Pokemon on the side of the road.  Well, substitute Pokemon for Bald Eagle or Rough Blazing Star and you have my life in a nutshell. I have literally pulled off on the side of the road for both species at various times in the last year.

I had a similar experience recently on the Cowles Bog Trail at Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore.  Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore is such a biodiverse area that I found dozens of plants I'd never seen before, mixed among old familiar favorites.  There are so many pictures that I am just going to name each plant below, along with a ! if it's new to me, and a * if it's on the edge of its range.

* Canada Mayflower (Maianthemum canadense)

! Horsetail species (Equisetum spp.)

! Swamp Rose (Rosa palustris)

Rattlesnake Fern (Botrypus virginianus)

Cinnamon Fern (Osmundastrum cinnamomeum)

!* Lowbush Blueberry (Vaccinium angustifolium)

St. John's Wort species (Hypericum spp.)

* Sand Phlox (Phlox bifida)

!* Kalm's St. John's Wort (Hypericum kalmianum)

Bracken (Pteridium aquilinum)

!* Wild Lupine (Lupinus perennis)

! New Jersey Tea (Ceoanthus americanus)

!* Hairy Puccoon (Lithospermum carolinese)

Butterfly Weed (Asclepias tuberosum)

Goat's Rue (Tephrosia virginiana)

! Phlox species (Phlox spp.)

! Skunk Cabbage (in foreground) (Symplocarpus foetidus)

Sensitive Fern (Onoclea sensibilis)

Blue-eyed Grass (Sisyrinchium spp.)

! Tall Thimbleweed (Anemone virginiana)

And, the best two for last:

! Michigan Lily (Lilium michiganense)

!*  Eurasian Helleborine Orchid (Epipactis helleborine)

This last plant  was the very last plant I found on our hike, growing on the side of the road next to the parking lot.  The only non-native species of orchid to widely colonize in North American, in parts of Michigan and the Northeast this species is actually a weed.  I have a hard time putting orchid and weed together in the same sentence.

I've noticed a tendency on my hikes for there to be one last great discovery at the very end.  I can think of at least five examples offhand.  This happens so often that I am now calling it Fifth Orchid Syndrome.

All in all, when combined with the bog visit I did earlier in the day (links here and here) and the great views of Lake Michigan  and the Chicago skyline from the dunes, this was the first day this year to rival the Ides of March trip (links here and here).  Considering I've barely left the state this year, I've managed to find so much anyway.

Oh, and I also found a new subspecies of snake, the rare Chicago Garter Snake(Thamnophis sirtalis semifasciatus) :

So, it was basically a perfect day.