Virginia Department
of Forestry

On this particular poke, we arrived both of us feeling stressed and somewhat harried from life and work events over the past few weeks. We quickly found a boulder on the water’s edge just to soak in the soothing sound of the moving water. Once restored, we headed on down the trail to see what we could see. Most noticeable were the splash of wildflowers, the profusion of ferns and the dance of many butterflies. Butterflies are hard to identify unless you can get a really good picture of them. That’s certainly easier said than done!

Beyond the most noticeable, we like to focus on the lesser-noticed beauty the forest has to offer: small fungi poking through the leaf litter, lacy patterns on leaves created by insects, unique shapes of tree trunks, designs and colors on rocks, and even the fabulous design of decomposing bark. Our most amazing discovery that day was some sort of insect case made out of folded fern leaflets. We found several and dissected one, but didn’t find anyone home.

We even enjoyed a refreshing dip in the river. A great poke, and a great day all the way around.