Moss plant, purple mountain heather. Photos by Jerry Jenkins
The Northern Forest Region contains about 265 species of woody plants. About a third, the generalists, are common in much or all of the region. Another third, the ecological specialists, are common but only in the right places. The remaining third, the outliers, are truly uncommon. They are plants that belong somewhere else – the cork elm in the Mississippi Valley, the moss plant in the tundra – and barely reach our area.
Here are nineteen specialists and outliers. They are favorites, because I don’t see them often, and because they remind me of travel and special places and people. We have photographs of these, and many others here. And we have a guide book, the Woody Plants of the Northern Forest, available from Cornell University Press.
Limy barrens and shores near the Great Lakes
Cork elm
Ninebark
Fragrant sumac
Fertile northern wetlands
Mountain fly honeysuckle
Shining rose
Balsam willow
Warm, dry, limy woods
Mockernut hickory
Red mulberry
Chinaquin oak
Alpine tundra
Lapland rosebay
Alpine azalea
Moss plant, purple mountain heather
Northern rocky coast
Green alder
Black crowberry
Dwarf huckleberry
Sandy coast
Groundsel bush
Marsh elder
Atlantic white cedar