Don Croner’s Wanders on the Great Allegheny Passage Bike Trail (GAP) | Flora | Yellow Voilets

At least five yellow violets occur along the GAP. The three most common are the Early Yellow Voilet (Viola rotundifolia), the Spear-leaf Violet (Viola hastata), and the Downy-yellow Violet (Viola pubescens). First of all, why are there yellow violets? Shouldn't violets be violet or at least blue, like the Common Blue Violet found along the GAP? Actually the word violet names a lineage, not a color. All true violets belong to the genus Viola, a worldwide group of roughly 525 to 600 species. The famous Swedish biologist Carolus Linnaeus (1707–1778) first named the purple-flowered species of Europe, but the genus Voila turned out to be far larger than its namesake: as botanists catalogued relatives across the Americas and Asia they kept finding plants with the same floral architecture — five petals and a spurred lower lip, in colors of white, cream, multicolor, and yellow. The genus name stuck; the color palette diversified. Yellow, in particular, is not an accident. It reads well in the dim light of a deciduous understory, where early-spring pollinators—small mining bees, bee flies, the occasional mason bee—are doing most of the work. The dark purple lines on the lower petal of yellow violets are nectar guides, painted to steer those visitors in. On the GAP, this is why Viola hastata, V. rotundifolia, and V. pubescens, are fully legitimate violets despite their yellow petals. Same family tree, same fritillary host role, same spring woodland habit—just wearing the understory’s preferred color.

Early Yellow Voilet. 04.04.26

Early Yellow Voilet. 04.04.26

Early Yellow Voilet. 04.04.26

Early Yellow Voilet. 04.04.26

The Spear-leaf Violet has spearhead-shaped leaves. 04.13.26

 Spear-leaf Violet. 04.12.26

 Spear-leaf Violet. 04.14.26

 Spear-leaf Violet. The dark purple lines on the lower petal are nectar
guides for pollinators to home in on. 04.13.26

Downy-yellow Violet. 04.16.26

Downy-yellow Violet. 04.16.26

Don Croner’s Wanders on the Great Allegheny Passage Bike Trail (GAP) | Flora | Common Blue Voilet

The Common Blue Violet (Viola sororia), a native of North America, appears from mid-April into June in open woods, forest edges, meadows, moist stream sides, and roadsides, and is quite common along some stretches of the GAP, at least where the margins have not been mowed. Each flower has five petals: a lower petal marked with darker veins and bearing a short spur, two lateral petals often bearded, and two upper petals more or less erect or spreading. Flowers are roughly a half inch across. The flowers and leaves of the Common Blue Violet are edible and have historically been used as food, but nowadays the plant is more valued for its aesthetic qualities, adding a lovely splash of blue to the mid-Spring palette of wildflowers.

Purple Deadnettle (Lamium purpureum) is another early bloomer along the GAP. If you see low-lying splashes of pinkish‑purple along the trail in late March and early April it is probably Purple Deadnettle. A native of Eurasia, it is now widely distributed in North America and thrives along roadsides, field margins, trail edges, and other disturbed sites, including the margins of the GAP, where it is very common and can appear as thick carpets.

Early Purple Deadnettle. 03.28.26

A dense, carpet-like colony of Purple Deadnettle bordering the GAP

Don Croner’s Wanders on the Great Allegheny Passage Bike Trail (GAP) | Ramps

Ramps Season has begun! For many foragers ramps (Allium tricoccum ) are the Holy Grail of edible plants. I located a dozen or more small colonies of ramps along a small tributary of the Casselman River.

Tributary of the Casselman River

A nice colony of ramps next to a convenient brooklet for washing them.

A small colony of ramps

Another colony of ramps

Ramps

Ramps

Most ramp plants have two leaves. One leaf can be harvested from a plant without killing it.

The whole ramp plant. Authorities recommend harvesting no more than 10% of a colony to  ensure its long-term health. I never harvest more than 5%. The leaves and bulbs can be used in any way you would use onions.

.

Don Croner’s Wanders on the Great Allegheny Passage (GAP) | Flora | Spring Beauty

Spring Beauties are out!!! 

Among plants native to North America Spring Beauty (Claytonia virginica), or Virginia Spring Beauty, is one of the first to flower, often appearing around the middle of March. GAPers are unlikely to see this plant in disturbed areas along the old railroad right-of-way, now the GAP bike trail. Spring Beauties are found in mature hardwood forests of White Oak, Red Oak, Maple, and Hickory trees on either side of the GAP, where they may appear in scattered clumps or even broad carpets. Spring Beauties are a true Spring ephemeral. Their entire above-ground life cycle is compressed into the brief window between snowmelt and the appearance of a canopy of leaves from trees which cast the plants into the shade. By early or mid-Summer the above-ground plant has disappeared completely. It overwinters underground as a small tuberous corm resembling a tiny potato only to resurface again the next Spring. 

The delicate flowers of Spring Beauty are roughly half an inch in diameter and borne in a loose cluster of 5 to 15 blossoms. Each flower has five petals that range from white to pale pink, lined with fine darker pink to magenta veins that serve as nectar guides for pollinators. The petals reflect ultraviolet light, making them highly visible  to bees. 

Don Croner’s Wanders on the Great Allegheny Passage (GAP) | Flora | Coltsfoot

Biked from Meyersdale south to the Big Savage Tunnel. Still no word from the GAP panjandrums on when the tunnel will open. When I arrived at the rest stop a guy in his mid-twenties was just packing up his camping gear. He had spent the night at the rest stop. He wanted to continue south on the GAP and asked if I knew any detours around the tunnel. Actually I do. At Mile Post 23, less than half a mile from the rest stop, a steep road turns off to the right, if you are coming from the tunnel, and drops down to Shirley Hollow Road. This road crosses Laurel Run—a beautiful little babbling brook at this point—and proceeds another 2.2 miles (up 240 vertical feet) to the tiny hamlet of Pleasant Union on Route 160. Truly determined GAPers can take this route to travel from Pittsburgh or points east to Cumberland when the Big Savage Tunnel is closed. (For more on the detour see my Wanders on the Great Allegheny Passage: Frostburg to Garrett.) At the intersection of Route 160 and Shirley Hollow Road turn right. After .65 of a mile the road drops down the side of Big Savage Mountain 3.7 miles to the Mason-Dixon Line (1,282 vertical feet) at the village of Wellersburg. The famous surveyors Mason and Dixon camped near here in June of 1766, the furthest point west they surveyed that year. They would return the next year and continue the survey of the Maryland-Pennsylvania border westward.

In Maryland the road, now Maryland Route 47, continues another 1.7 miles to Barrelville, on Route 36, the Mount Savage Road, with a drop of another 200 vertical feet. Turn right here and proceed .6 of a mile to Woodcock Hollow Road. It’s another 1.6 of a mile up the road, with a vertical altitude gain of 303 feet, to the GAP at the Woodcock Hollow Road Crossing. From here you can proceed on the GAP to either Frostburg or Cumberland. Doing this trip in reverse, with the 5.6-mile climb up Big Savage Mountain from Barrelville to the Shirley Hollow Road cutoff, with a vertical altitude gain of 1516 feet, is certainly doable on electric bikes (I did it), but it would test the endurance of Olympian athletes on regular bikes. If you are traveling south and are hell-bent on getting to Cumberland as fast as possible this detour is 3.85 miles shorter than the GAP between the same two points (Shirley Hollow Road cutoff and the Woodcock Hollow Crossroads), eliminating as it does the big loop around Frostburg, You can also make excellent time flying down off Big Savage Mountain, your speed limited only by how fast you dare to go.

I told the young man it was possible to this but that I was not necessarily recommending that he try. This is fairly easy ride on electric bikes but the climb from Laurel Run up to Route 160 might be difficult for someone on a regular bike. Also, I did not know the current condition of Shirley Hollow Road, which is unpaved. It might still be muddy and difficult to navigate. The guy said he was going to try it, however. I hope he got through.

I walked up upstream on Laurel Run, the stream the GAP crosses just north of the tunnel. I was looking for golden saxifrage, blood root, and various trilliums, all among the first plants to appear in the Spring. I found nothing in bloom. Jack-in-the-Pulpits also occur here, although not of course until the end of spring and the beginning of Summer.

Laurel Run

I rode back towards Meyersdale and was startled to see just before the Continental Divide several clumps of coltsfoot. I had scanned the right-of-way of the GAP very carefully riding south and they were not here when I passed by three hours earlier.

Coltsfoot

Coltsfoot

Coltsfoot

Coltsfoot

Coltsfoot

These are the first flowers I have seen in bloom the GAP this year. Riding on I saw numerous clumps of coltsfoot the whole way to Meyersdale. None had been in bloom that morning. They had appeared in the space of three hours.

Don Croner’s Wanders on the Great Allegheny Passage Bike Trail (GAP) | Spring Flora and Fauna

Biked from Meyersdale westward on the GAP to Rockwood and then rode back to Meyersdale and continued south to Big Savage Tunnel. Still no word from the GAP panjandrums on when the tunnel will be opened for the year. Anyhow, the trail is totally snow and ice-free from the Big Savage Tunnel to Rockwood. Saw the first robin of the year back on March 1—oddly enough the same date I saw the first robin last year—and have been seeing more and more of them every day. For my love affair with robins see Wanders on the Great Allegheny Passage: Frostburg to Garrett.

Also saw half a dozen wedges of Canadian geese winging it north for the season. A few took a break on a frozen pond just north the Sand Patch Crossroads.

Canadian Honkers

I also stopped to collect bark from the yellow birch south of Sand Patch. I got a whole garbage bag full. There is nothing better for starting campfires.

Yellow Birch

Not much vegetation yet, but I did see the young leaves of dandelion

Dandelions

Also the early leaves of ox-eyed daisies. 

 Early leaves of Ox-Eyed Daisies

Don Croner’s Wanders on the Great Allegheny Passage Bike Trail | Early Flora

Spring is eighteen days away. Three days ago this section of the GAP south of Meyersdale was covered with snow. Now the verges of trail are tinged with green. 

Some green vegetation has already appeared:

Young leaves of dame’s rocket

Mature Dame’s Rocket. 05.01.2025

Mature Dame’s Rocket. 05.01.2025

Don Croner’s Wanders on the Great Allegheny Passage Bike Trail (GAP) | Flora | Bee Balm

Bee balm (Monarda didyma) is a native North American medicinal and aromatic herb belonging to the Lamiaceae (mint) family. This perennial plant, which typically grows in colonies, is indigenous to eastern North America, where it naturally occurs in bottomlands, thickets, moist woodlands, and along stream banks and is particularly well-suited to the riparian environments found along trails such as the GAP. The name has a dual meaning. The crushed leaves were traditionally applied as a balm to bee stings and minor skin irritations to soothe pain and reduce infections, and the flowers themselves are also highly attractive to bees and other pollinators.

The plant is also known as Oswego tea. The Oswego Native Americans around the Oswego River in upstate New York used an infusion of the flower and leaves to treat a variety of ailments, including coughs and colds, fever, abdominal pains, and flatulence, and in a poultice to treat sore eyes. They also used it in cooking to flavor game, especially birds, and drank infusions of the leaves as a beverage. Early European settlers learned this latter usage from them and after the Boston Tea Party, when imported tea was boycotted, adopted it as a local substitute, calling it “Oswego tea” (please keep in mind that the only true tea is made from the tea plant, Camellia sinensis). Bee balm is also known as bergamot, but it should not be confused with another plant known as wild bergamot (Monarda fistulosa), which has lavender-colored flowers instead of the distinctive scarlet flowers of Monarda didyma. 

Nor should bee balm, Oswego tea, or bergamot be confused with the bergamot citrus tree, a native of southern Italy. An essential oil from the peel of the fruit of the bergamot orange tree is used as a flavoring in the famous Earl Grey tea blend. The taste of bee balm has an almost uncanny similarity to the taste of the bergamot orange, and thus the native American plant also became known as bergamot. The dried leaves of bee balm mixed with loose black tea will produce a brew that can be differentiated from Earl Grey tea only by hard-core tea cognoscenti. Infusions and tinctures of bee balm alone are used to treat indigestion and nausea, intestinal cramps, and diarrhea. Bee balm also serves as a nervine tonic and relaxant, exerting a calming effect on the nervous system without causing excessive sedation. The plant also has great aesthetic value, with its lovely scarlet flowers brilliantly festooning the edges of the GAP. 

Bee Balm

Bee Balm

Bee Balm

Bee Balm