Life Along the Upper Conestoga

     For an hour and a half in the afternoon of a few days ago, I explored a few spots along the upper reaches of the Conestoga River where it is more like a creek.  Most of that upper part of the Conestoga is in lovely, sunny meadows in beautiful farmland in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.  The feel of autumn was in the air, the sky was partly clear, patched with white and gray cumulus clouds, and I saw a variety of flowering plants, floodplain trees and a few kinds of birds along the river.
     The white blooms of Queen-Anne's-lace and the yellow blossoms of evening primrose were abundant on the slightly higher, drier ground near the Conestoga.  But a greater variety of flowering plants flourished in the river, and in the moist soil on the edge of it.  Water stargrass is an emergent, grass-like plant that forms mats in shallow water.  Its long, lean leaves undulate with the current and its small, yellow flowers emerge from the water to be pollinated by wind and insects.  Some of those mats of water stargrass resemble lawns with golden blooms in the shallows. 
     Alga, other types of vegetation and fallen, dead leaves collect on those rugs of stargrass, forming platforms that dragonflies, small frogs, turtles and water snakes, and other little critters rest on.  Minnows and other kinds of small fish hide among the long, waving strands of this plant. 
     Arrowhead and forget-me-not plants flourish in wet ground along the shores of the Conestoga.  Arrowhead plants have arrow-head-shaped leaves, and white flowers during August.
     Forget-me-nots have tiny, pretty flowers with blue petals and yellow centers during July and August.  Patches of this lovely plant add much beauty to waterway shores.
     I also saw lots of bushy-looking spotted jewelweeds with their orange flowers, much New York ironweed that have hot-pink blossoms, a little purple loosestrife with their pink blooms, and a few cardinal flower plants that have red flowers, all in low spots of ground among patches of tall reed canary-grass and cockleburs near Conestoga shorelines.  I saw a ruby-throated hummingbird dipping its long beak into cornocopia-shaped jewelweed blooms to lap up energy-giving nectar.  And several each of cabbage white, yellow sulphur and silver-spotted skipper butterflies visited ironweed and loosestrife blossoms to sip sugary nectar.
     A variety of bottomland, floodplain trees are established in the damp soil of some meadows along the Upper Conestoga, as they are along other waterways in this area.  I noted tall, massive sycamore trees with their mottled bark, black walnuts, some drooping with heavy, green-husked walnuts and river birches that have thin bark that peels off in decorative, little curls.  I also saw crack willows, honey locusts, some with many sharp thorns sprouting from their bark on trunks and limbs, white ashes and shagbark hickories, some of which were laden with green-husked nuts.  And I noticed red maples, silver maples and pin oaks, the latter having small acorns that gray squirrels and blue jays will gather in October for winter use.  These floodplain trees provide shade for livestock and wildlife in the cow pastures.  And they are beautiful to us people and supply food and shelter for several kinds of wildlife through the year.
     I saw attractive orange and red berries of deadly nightshade vines among those plants' dark-green leaves and purple-petaled flowers that have yellow stamens protruding beyond the purple, making a striking combination of colors.  Deadly nightshade is related to tomato plants and like them produce fruit that is green, then ripens to yellow, orange and, finally, red.  Many deadly nightshade vines exhibit all those colors at once, including green, yellow, purple, orange and red.  Birds can eat those berries, but people can not!
     I noticed many dull-blue berries on a few gray-stemmed dogwood shrubs along the Conestoga.  An immature gray catbird was consuming some of those berries.
     I watched four species of fish-catching birds here and there along the Conestoga.  A belted kingfisher winged rapidly downstream while emitting its rattling call.  An immature green-backed heron landed on a gravel bar where it hunted crayfish and minnows.  A stately great egret waded cautiously in shallow water and caught a few small fish as I watched.  And, at the same time, a majestic great blue heron stalked slowly through grass about 30 yards away from the Conestoga.  Suddenly, the great blue thrust its long neck and beak forward into the grass and caught a chunky meadow mouse that I saw struggling in the heron's powerful bill.  The heron clamped its beak down on the mouse a few times to stun or kill it, dunked its victim in a puddle a few times to slick its fur for easier swallowing, tossed the prey into the air a few inches and swallowed it head-first and whole.   
      One never knows what beautiful and interesting part of nature will be experienced until one gets out into nature.  Almost always something of nature will be noted when a person immerses him or herself in nature, even close to home.  Experiencing nature is enjoyable and inspirational.  Much wonderful life can even be experienced along waterways in cropland.