
Flora Columnist
Reading the landscape can be really engaging for those who take to our local trails with an intention to get more than exercise or a dog walk. Whether it’s a strand of rusted barbed wire captured inside the trunk of a tree or an unexpected area covered with English ivy or periwinkle, one may be curious enough to linger and consider what occurred there long ago. Sometimes the answer is quickly evident, as when an old gravesite is spied amidst the traditionally planted ivy or Vinca minor (commonly called periwinkle or myrtle).
Sometimes one spots brightly colored surveyors’ marking tape or freshly hacked saplings, indicating recent property line surveys. These sightings can easily send a concerned walker to Town Hall with inquiries about potential dramatic landscape alterations.
A pleasant read for inquisitive walkers is Reading the Landscape by May Thielgaard Watts, a book long out of print but generally found in libraries and used bookstores. Watts, a legendary naturalist at Morton Arboretum near Chicago, loved helping young and old alike “read†the meanings of local landscapes.
Last week, I discovered a trail that was new to me, in Duke Forest. Reserved for foot traffic only, it’s located just a short way along Duke Forest Durham Division trail C, which is accessed via N.C. 751, beyond the roundabout west of U.S. 15-501 bypass.
Interpretive signs along the trail help walkers understand the land-use history of the diversity of habitats the trail traverses.
At the bottom of the first slope, there’s a kiosk displaying a cross section of a 212-year-old white oak victim of Hurricane Fran’s devastation 15 years ago. One can feel insignificant while reflecting on all the human history that tree witnessed in a life that began when George Washington was president.
The forest landscape a walker encounters up beyond the fallen giant is a sharp contrast to the undisturbed north-facing slope of mature beech and tulip poplar that’s just been crossed. Ahead is a mix of struggling small trees, some of which may one day be forest giants like the ones that have fallen down all around them. Mounds of rocky red clay soil are scattered about on the forest floor; these remnants of the big trees felled by Hurricane Fran give an eerie, ghostly feel to their surroundings.
An interpretive marker in an area of scattered big trees where saplings fill the canopy gaps causes one to pause and consider the possibility that this may have been an early-settler “wood lot.†The forest would have been fenced off to contain the livestock foraging within. Suitable trees would have been selectively cut for building materials or firewood. This was certainly a gentler harvesting of forest resources than the visually unappealing practice of clear-cutting.
Other forest history stories are found along the trail, which continues up and down through different forest types, including some variously managed pine plantations.
If you explore this trail soon, I’ll wager you’ll discover spots you’ll want to revisit for wildflowers in the spring, like that north-facing beech slope.
Excellent maps for this and dozens of the other Duke Forest trails are available at Duke Garden’s gift shop or on line at dukeforest.duke.edu.
Email Ken Moore at flora@carrborocitizen.com.
Read more Ken Moore Citizen columns at The Annotated Flora.



In case you’re interested, the original Shepard Nature trail in Duke Forest was established in 1995 as a Boy Scout Eagle project and suffered quite a bit of damage the next year from Hurricane Fran. In late 2002, the trail was restored as Paul Thissen’s Eagle project, under the direction of advisor Alfred Reid, Duke Forest staff, and scout leader Ed Bedford, and with the aid of many members of Chapel Hill’s Boy Scout Troop 820. At that time, the historical tree slice was placed in its kiosk, erosion barriers were installed on the trail, and a historical settlers’ spring was cleared farther down the trail alongside a small creek.
Nice post.
Actually, Reading the Landscape by May Theilgaard Watts is not out of print. The original, 1957, edition is, but the expanded 1975 edition has been reissued. Full title is Reading the Landscape of America. ISBN 978-0-912550-23-7. It’s available from Amazon and other on-line sellers, and from the publishers, Nature Study Guild Publishers.