Ohio History – Fort Recovery.

Last September, I visited a small Ohio town chock-full of history.  I enjoy visiting such places in my state, seeing the architecture, parks and special attractions, but this one deserved a post of its own.

Fort Recovery is located on the Ohio-Indiana border in western Ohio.  1,400 people live there; agriculture is the predominant business.  I was in the town on a Sunday afternoon- it was pretty quiet and relaxing, like most small towns.  People occasionally drove on the roads with golf carts.

There were several murals in town depicting historical subjects.  This really gives the place ‘personality’.

I just had to add this- there was an IGA grocery store in town. I grew up in a small town with one of these, I rarely see them anymore.

Street names reflected the historical theme.

And history is present in many locations here.

Right in the middle of downtown, there was a marker where General Richard Butler– an officer in Arthur St. Clair‘s militia force that was probing the Native American forces in the area in 1791- died in the largest defeat American forces ever suffered at the hands of Native Americans.  It is usually called St. Clair’s defeat.  Between 600-900 whites were killed by the Indian Confederacy led by famed chiefs Little Turtle of the Miami tribe and Blue Jacket of the Shawnee tribe.

Butler had been severely wounded by a bullet, and told his two brothers to leave him under a huge oak tree.  Warriors were overrunning the battle field and the militia was fleeing in panic.  Butler was given two cocked pistols and left propped up against the tree.  His bones would be found two years later.

Here’s the sites I visited in the area that day.

Source of the Wabash River

Not far outside of town along State Route 49 was a tiny park in the middle of endless rows of corn.  I pulled in and found that this area was where the Wabash River formed.

The Wabash flows on to drain most of Indiana, forming its border with Illinois before running into the Mississippi.  Long used by Native Americans as a trading route between the Great Lakes and the Ohio River, it was first mapped by French explorers in the 17th century.  This river has seen much history- no less than five battles have taken place near its banks, two of which happened in the area now occupied by Fort Recovery.

The river used to run right by the site of Fort Recovery, but its course has changed over the centuries, particularly to channel its flow around farmland.

It’s humbling to think that this small trickle of water eventually becomes a major river and joins with the Mighty Mississippi as its largest northern tributary.

Fort Recovery Monument Park

In town, a must-see place is Fort Recovery Monument Park.

This park has a large obelisk, a pair of cannon, markers and plaques with information about the site, and a veteran’s memorial.

In 1908, President William Howard Taft signed a bill that allowed for the building of a monument in Fort Recovery. The monument was built in 1912 and dedicated on July 1, 1913. The obelisk stands at 101′, 4″ tall. It weighs approximately 800 tons and cost $23,700 to build.

The nine foot statue depicts a frontiersman facing west and looking out at the beautiful land into which he triumphed.

Underneath the base of the monument are the remains of those people killed under the commands of Arthur St. Clair and Anthony Wayne. 32 medallions surround the base of the monument, each inscribed with the name of an officer killed in battle here. Four bronze plaques also surround the base of the monument.

To this day, each Memorial Day weekend, over 900 crosses are placed in Monument Park in remembrance of the fallen soldiers.

Fort Recovery Pioneer Cemetery

Several blocks away is the oldest cemetery in Mercer County.  Mr. & Mrs. John Simison, two of the earliest pioneers in the area, were buried here in 1820.  Other pioneers followed when their time came.

In 1851, bones of militiamen from St. Clair’s Defeat were found along the banks of the Wabash River.  They were interred here with 5,000 people looking on.  In 1891 the remains were re-buried at Monument Park.  Only the pioneers remain.

Fort Recovery Museum Grounds

 

The two main events commemorated at Fort Recovery are St. Clair’s Defeat and Wayne’s Victory, also known as the Battle of Fort Recovery.  The latter battle was a response to the former.  The young United States wanted land, the only real wealth it possessed at the time, and through dubious treaties with Native Americans claiming to represent whole tribes it bought a substantial part of the Northwest Territory (the Ohio Territory being the closest to the states).  Native Americans combined into a great confederation- the one really successful confederation they made- and fought to keep their land.  After St. Clair’s Defeat, President Washington persuaded Congress to create a standing army to conquer the Ohio Territory (and beyond).  So the Legion of the United States, commanded by Revolutionary War hero ‘Mad’ Anthony Wayne, was born.  Wayne and the Legion were much better-trained and equipped than the typical militia of the time and defeated the Indian Confederation.

This log cabin- the home of Delores and John Eischen- was originally built in 1840 and was moved near to the museum.

Many 19th century items are on display there.

At the museum park, there is a blacksmith shop and tool shed.

 

Seeing all of the 19th century tools reminds one that life was rather hard then, compared to our current situation.

This area of the grounds is where the Wabash River flowed in the 1790s when the fort was built near its banks.

Time capsules are cool!  I wonder what they will think of this one in 2041?

The remains of an unknown Shawnee warrior were buried near this rock.  He was commemorated by Native Americans in 1983.

Fort Recovery, the Recreated Stockade

This is a 1956 recreation of two blockhouses and the stockade wall between them- one side of Fort Recovery.  This is how the fort, built by General Anthony Wayne’s thousands of troops over 5 days in December 1793 in the Ohio wilderness, would have looked.  It was named Fort Recovery because Wayne’s Legion recovered the bones of hundreds of militiamen scattered over the ground from St. Clair’s Defeat here two years earlier.

The stockade walls were thick enough to stop musket balls, and short enough that soldiers could fire over them.

The blockhouses were two stories tall, with a fireplace, benches and beds.  Imagine how cold this would be in winter.  Soldiers lived in them- the officers got their own quarters.

The firing ports allowed soldiers to repel attacks while staying under cover.

There was an endless supply of wood for the fireplace- outside of the fort.  Men would collect firewood under armed guard.  Native American warriors preferred ambushes of these parties and supply trains- hit them where they are vulnerable.

The blockhouses were solidly built.  Imagine the boredom of being stationed here, spiced with the terror of ‘Indian’ attack or capture.

The Battle of Fort Recovery was fought here in 1794.  The Indian Confederation under Little Turtle & Blue Jacket that had won the greatest victory over American forces three years ago ambushed a supply train outside of the fort, driving them back inside with losses.  Some of the tribes attacked the fort, which was very hard to take without cannon (that their allies the British refused to supply).  The warriors were repulsed by fire from the fort, especially the blockhouses.  This American victory was followed up a couple months later by the Battle of Fallen Timbers, which decisively defeated the Indian Confederation and led to the Treaty of Greenville, ceding much of current Ohio to the Americans.

On the grounds of the fort, a survey stake was driven into the ground to mark the western end of the Greenville Treaty Line, dividing tribal lands from newly-conquered American territory.  The actual wooden stake, driven in the ground in 1795, was found; it was 42 inches deep.  It is now in the nearby museum.

Fort Recovery Museum

A definite highlight of the trip was the museum.  A modest fee can be avoided if you are an Ohio History Connection (formerly the Ohio Historical Society) member.  I’m a member but I always pay entry fees, because I know how much they need the money.

The lady working at the museum was very pleasant and knowledgeable.  We discussed the fort and the battles that raged on this land centuries ago.  She recommended a book, Autumn of the Black Snake: The Creation of the U.S. Army and the Invasion That Opened the West by William Hogeland, that recounted St. Clair’s Defeat, the creation of the controversial first standing army of the United States, and Anthony Wayne’s campaign that beat the Indian Confederation, leading to most of the Ohio Territory (and elsewhere) being conquered.  I bought and read the book, and highly recommend it to anyone interested in the subject.  It is very detailed and well-researched.

The museum had lots of informative text and graphics, with artifacts from the times, even from this very site.

Blue Jacket was a courageous war chief, but had a falling-out with his Confederation co-leader Little Turtle.  Trouble came from this division.  It was difficult to keep the Confederation together, seeing how the tribes all had different views and there was no way to compel obedience.

General ‘Mad’ Anthony Wayne was an abysmal failure as a businessman and a family man, but he was a superb commander of soldiers.  From the time he was a child, he always wanted to lead men.

The artifacts were fascinating to look at.

 

Life-size mannequins wore typical garb and carried equipment then in use.

Flintlock muskets were the typical firearm of the time.  Rifles (called such because of the rifling inside the barrels that increased accuracy) were also used.  The lead ammunition was large compared to standard modern firearms.  One could easily see why being hit in an arm or a leg often meant amputation.  Men carried bullet molds and bars of lead to melt down into ammunition in those days.  Gunpowder was a precious substance.

Forts were strong defensive positions that usually could only be taken by siege, cannon fire or subterfuge.

Women and even children would accompany troops (especially militias).

“…I fell in with Lieutenant Shaumburgh (who if my recollection serves me was the only officer of artillery that got away unhurt), with Corporal Mott & a woman who was called red headed Nance – the latter two were both crying. Mott was lamenting the loss of his wife & Nance of an infant child. Shaumburgh was nearly exhausted & hung on Motts arm. I carried his fuse & accoutrements & led Nance. In this sociable way we came together & arrived at [Fort] Jefferson a little after sunset.”

-Memoirs of Benjamin Van Cleve

 

Western Ohio saw a whole string of forts and battles as Americans moved north from Cincinnati (then a village along the Ohio River flatboat route) towards Fort Detroit, Great Britain’s main outpost in the Northwest Territories.  All of this territory was Native American land supposedly ‘bought’ by the government, eager to pay off Revolutionary War soldiers with land- since the government was deeply in debt.

Upstairs was a room devoted to ancient Native American artifacts.

Here’s a nice timeline of the inhabitants of North America and what their cultures were like- hunter-gatherers, agriculturalists, mound builders, copperworkers…all with distinctive stone tools.

 

 

Looking down at the ground floor of the museum- what a great place!  History really came alive for me in Fort Recovery.

Always sign the guest book!

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North America’s Rarest Warbler.

Kirtland’s Warbler

This is a blog post I am extremely happy to be able to post!  I- along with many other birders in the central Ohio area- have seen the rarest warbler in North America a week ago, thanks to a sharp-eyed child and the Internet.

Here’s the story I got from a birder friend.  A birder was walking with his young son at Battelle Darby Metro Park (an old favorite park of mine) at the western edge of Franklin County.  The young son pointed to a pretty bird on the fence along the trail they were walking.  The birder dad took a closer look, and realized what he saw.

The news went out online, on various Facebook groups, eBird, and the Ohio Birds Listserv.  People flocked to see the bird…including me.  I dropped everything and drove out there, not wasting any time.

Battelle-Darby is a large park- over 7,000 acres.  The particular area where the bird was hanging out was near the Nature Center, near the Bison fields.  I’ll talk about these features of this great park one day, but right now, there are more pressing things to discuss…

Yes, news travels fast in the Internet Age.  A crowd of excited birders are staking out the area where the bird had been seen since that morning- a treeline with a wooden fence in front of it.

Autumn wildflowers- Goldenrod and Asters- grace the area.  It’s a great time of year.  It’s also autumn migration, with September seeing neotropical birds heading south to a warmer place to spend the winter.

And back in the treeline- there is the bird!

It worked its way among the bushes.

And then it perched on the fence, looking for things to eat in the nearby foliage.  This bird wasn’t scared of the crowd, 20 feet away, gazing in appreciation at her, and taking many pictures.

Large warbler, yellow breast, white eye right, fine black streaking, gray rump, white undertail coverts, brownish-gray back, a constantly pumping tail.  Classic signs of a Kirtland’s Warbler.

This bird caught small caterpillars as we watched.  This is a rare treat indeed.  I called my best friend, also a birder, and he drove like a maniac out to see and photograph the bird.  You owe me, buddy!

Kirtland’s Warblers are an endangered species.  The US Fish and Wildlife Service tells us that it has kept track of the numbers found- traditionally, nesting only in the jack pine forests of a certain age in Michigan- and there were as few as 400 of them in 1971.  In 2011, over 1,800 singing males were recorded, so they are making somewhat of a comeback.  This puts into perspective how few of these birds there are, and seeing one out of its small nesting grounds is rare.

Primarily insect eaters, Kirtland’s warblers forage for insects and larvae near the ground and in lower parts of pines and oaks. They also eat blueberries.

Kirtland’s warblers nest only on the ground near the lower branches and in large stands of young jack pines that are 5 to 20 feet tall and 6 to 22 years old. The tree’s age is crucial, although biologists are not sure why. It is possible that the birds need low branches near the ground to help conceal their nests. Before the trees are six years old, the lower branches are not large enough to hide the nest. After 15 years, these lower branches begin to die.

Kirtland’s warblers require large stands of young, dense jack pine forest at least 80 acres in size, but they prefer stands of 300 to 400 acres, or larger. Their exacting requirements for nesting, as well as cowbird parasitism, caused a drastic decline in numbers and led the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to list the Kirtland’s warbler as an endangered species in 1967.

Until 1995 Kirtland’s warblers had only been known to nest in the northern part of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula. Today, they also nest in the Upper Peninsula, and since 2007, have nested in Wisconsin and Canada. They migrate from their nesting grounds to the southeastern coast of the United States on their way to wintering grounds in the Bahamas.

Once it was believed that forest fires harmed the environment. However, we now know that fires play an important role in forest ecosystems. For example, without fire, jack pine cones do not completely release their seeds. Suppressing forest fires prevented the natural establishment of new jack pine stands. Since Kirtland’s warblers will only nest in stands of young jack pines, the population dwindled dramatically before scientists realized that there is a role for fire in forest ecology — and in the Kirtland’s warbler life history.

The second greatest threat to Kirtland’s warbler survival is the brown-headed cowbird. Cowbirds lay eggs in other bird’s nests, leaving the unsuspecting hosts to incubate and care for the young cowbirds. This is called nest parasitism…

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, in cooperation with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, the U.S. Forest Service and the Michigan Audubon Society, initiated an aggressive cowbird removal program in 1972 that has continued to this day. As a result, Kirtland’s warblers now have very good nesting success and enough young are being produced to increase the population.

This young female is one of an estimated 3,600 Kirtland’s Warblers in the wild today, a number slowly increasing due to habitat management and Cowbird control in their area.

I always planned to go up to Michigan to see them on their breeding territory, but never expected to see one migrating through one of my favorite parks!

This bird was seen in the same area for 4 days, and then it was off to the Bahamas.  Good place to spend the winter if you ask me.

To date, this has been the most exciting life list bird I’ve seen.  I’ve seen 279 bird species in the state of Ohio now.

A Park that used to be a Quarry.

Oakes Quarry Park

Lark Sparrow

I read about a rare (for Ohio) sparrow this summer on the Ohio Birds Listserv.  It was seen in a suburb of Dayton, Ohio, not terribly far away from me.  And the park it was seen in sounded interesting as well.

So I decided to go look!

Oakes Quarry Park is located in Fairborn, Ohio, right outside of Dayton’s freeway outerbelt.  It is part of the Fairborn Parks system and is one of several locations under the stewardship of the Beaver Creek Wetlands Association of Greene County.

One of the first things I noticed hiking around Oakes Quarry Park is that it is more of a quarry-turned-park than a park.  There are remnants of stone quarry activity everywhere, along with a central wetlands area and some restored prairie.

There’s a 30-foot overlook from a quarried stone wall around much of the park, with scattered stonework over much of the area.  The park is essentially a big bowl with a stony rim around it.  Narrow hiking trails and a horse bridle trail encircle the area.

This site was originally surface mined in 1929 for limestone to make cement by Southwestern Portland Cement Company and Southdown Inc., before being sold to the Oakes family in the 1990’s. The family donated the land to the City of Fairborn in 2003.

Oakes Quarry Park is the second largest park in Fairborn. The park includes foot trails and horseback trails that cross ancient limestone fossils exposed by the mining activity that formed the quarry. Conservation work here is developing prairies and wetlands once common in the area and the northern edge is nice woodland.

Clean Ohio Conservation Fund assisted with the development of the park including invasive species removal and reforestation of 8,000 trees.

The hiking trail takes you back in time 440 million years, when all of this was a coral reef in a shallow sea. Researchers from the Ohio State University say these Silurian Age crinoid fossils are the best in the U.S. and represent an exceptional site worldwide. More recently, glaciers left grooves, slides and polishings in the rock before the last ice age ended 14,000 years ago.

Glacial striation marks can be seen upon this rocky area- a layer of ice over a kilometer in height once covered over half of Ohio many thousands of years ago, and left its marks by advancing and retreating.

Sand was also common in the park, and plentiful bird tracks showed that sand baths are popular here.

Close proximity to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base meant lots of airplanes in the sky, including some vintage planes.

There were all sorts of interesting dry-soil wildflowers to be seen, like this Thistle.

Butterflyweed

St. John’s Wort

Butterflies were common visitors to the wildflowers. A Silver-Spotted Skipper sips upon an interesting wildflower I haven’t identified yet- I’ve only seen it in this park!

A Monarch Butterfly upon Blue Vervain

An Orange Sulfur upon Common Teasel

A Widow Skimmer Dragonfly- a common summer sight in Ohio’s natural areas

Birds of course were in the park- including Mourning Doves…

A male Eastern Towhee called from the shade

A Killdeer- Ohio’s most common shorebird- was in the water of a shallow pond

A male House Finch

A male Indigo Bunting, a familiar Ohio summer bird singing from a perch

One of the many Field Sparrows inhabiting the park that scolded me

There was another sparrow I was looking for in this brushy area of the park- one that is rarely seen breeding  in Ohio.

Suddenly, I spotted a large sparrow with white on its tail flying by, landing in a Sycamore Tree.  It was the bird I sought!

The bird sang its complex song- that along with its elaborate mask identified it as a Lark Sparrow.

This large sparrow may be brown, but its harlequin facial pattern and white tail spots make it a standout among sparrows. Males sing a melodious jumble of churrs, buzzes, and trills reminiscent of an Old World lark. Their courtship is also unusual, involving a hopping and crouching display unlike other sparrows. Lark Sparrows occur in the West and the Great Plains in prairies, grasslands, and pastures with scattered shrubs. In winter, look for them in small flocks in brushy areas.

I’m always happy to see a new life-list bird species, and it was a bonus to get a few very good photos as it sang.

Oakes Quarry Park was a very interesting place to visit- I’ll definitely be back, looking for some examples of its famed Crinoid fossils!

 

Ohio History – Simon Kenton’s Grave.

One recent spring I went on a road trip that included a stop in Urbana, Ohio to indulge in some state history.

I enjoy the journey as much as the destination- driving Ohio’s backroads.

Eventually, I reached Urbana.

Urbana is a city in and the county seat of Champaign County, Ohio, United States, 47 miles west of Columbus. Urbana was laid out in 1805, and for a time in 1812 was the headquarters of the Northwestern army during the War of 1812. It is the burial place of the explorer and Indian fighter Simon Kenton. The population was 11,793 at the 2010 census. It is the home of Urbana University.

As usual, I enjoyed sightseeing the old homes.

The main reason I was in Urbana was to see a particular memorial in Oakdale Cemetery.

On the way to the memorial, I saw this interesting sculpture.  It was done by the grandfather of the founder of Urbana, both of whom were buried here.

John Quincy Adams Ward (June 29, 1830 – May 1, 1910) was an American sculptor, who may be most familiar for his larger than lifesize standing statue of George Washington on the steps of Federal Hall National Memorial in New York City…He died at his home in New York City in 1910. A copy of his Indian Hunter stands at his gravesite in Urbana, and his Urbana home is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

I always like running into an unexpected piece of history!

Onward to the main event.

And then, what I had been looking for- the grave of Simon Kenton, ‘Ohio’s Daniel Boone’.

Simon Kenton was a legendary frontiersman in Ohio and the Midwest. He was born on April 3, 1755, in Fauquier County, Virginia. He grew up helping his father on the family farm and therefore had little opportunity to go to school. At the age of sixteen, Kenton became involved in a fight involving a woman. Believing he had killed a man, he fled to the Ohio Country where he changed his name to Simon Butler…In 1782, he discovered that the man that he thought he had killed had actually lived. Therefore, he was able to resume his own name once again.

Kenton spent the next two years hunting along the Ohio River. In 1774, he served as a scout during Lord Dunmore’s War. By 1775, Kenton had moved to Boonesborough, Kentucky. For the next few years, he worked as a scout for the settlement, often coming in contact with the local American Indians. At one point, Kenton is said to have saved the life of Daniel Boone.

During the American Revolution, Kenton participated in a number of military engagements against the British and their American Indian allies. In 1778, he joined George Rogers Clark on a difficult but successful expedition into the Illinois Country to attack British outposts as well as American Indian settlements. Returning home, he accompanied Daniel Boone in an attack on the Shawnees’s settlement of Chillicothe near what is now Oldtown, Ohio. That same year, Kenton was captured by American Indians, who tortured him and attempted to burn him at the stake. Simon Girty rescued him and instead of his being killed, Kenton was sent to Fort Detroit as part of a prisoner trade with the British. By mid-1779, Kenton was free and had returned to service under George Rogers Clark.

During the next several years, Kenton lived a relatively quiet life. He settled near Maysville, Kentucky, married Martha Dowden and purchased some large tracts of land. This life continued until 1794, when Kenton served in the militia under General Anthony Wayne and fought at the Battle of Fallen Timbers. After the death of his wife, Kenton remarried in 1798 and the same year moved to Ohio. He first lived near present-day Springfield but a few years later settled in Urbana. By 1805, Kenton had become a brigadier general in the Ohio militia. During the War of 1812, he participated in the Battle of the Thames in Canada.

Kenton moved to the Zanesfield, Ohio, area around 1820. During the last years of his life, Kenton lived in poverty because of land ownership disputes and mismanagement of his money. He survived on a government pension of twenty dollars a month. In 1836, Kenton died in Logan County near Zanesfield and was buried there. In 1865, his remains were moved to Urbana. The state of Ohio constructed a monument to mark his grave in 1884.

It’s hard to imagine today the hardships that frontiersmen like Kenton went through.

A big man in stature and strength, his stamina was often tested as he endured the worst that was known to the frontier. During the late winter of 1773, Simon’s first winter on the frontier, Simon and two companions were attacked around the campfire as they were drying their wet clothes near present day Charleston, WV. One companion was killed, while Simon and the other man barely escaped without food, clothing, or rifles. After a week of wandering down the Great Kanawha River, they finally reached the Ohio. Here they met some mountain men on the banks of the Ohio River after a week of hunger and extreme exposure to the weather.

The Indians also knew him as “The man who’s gun is never empty” for his skill of running and reloading his faithful flintlock at the same time.

Near Kenton’s monument is his original tombstone from 1836.  Suffering the ravages of time, it is difficult to see in this photograph, but the last line is: ‘He was an honest man’.  This is high praise from that era.

In April 1777, during an Indian attack on Fort Boonesborough in Kentucky, a bullet struck Daniel Boone’s leg and he found himself staring up at a Shawnee’s tomahawk. Kenton charged, shot the scalper and clubbed another attacker, then lifted Boone up in his arms and carried him, dodging and darting, to safety.

“Well, Simon, you have behaved like a man to-day,” Boone told him; “indeed you are a fine fellow.” Effusive praise for frontiersmen.

Although he was an Indian fighter, Kenton dealt fairly with the Shawnee Indians, who respected his skill and stamina, and he knew Techumseh, their great chief.

In September of 1778, Simon was captured by the Shawnee. He was forced to run the infamous quarter mile “gauntlet”, which killed many prisoners, nine times. After the sixth, while attempting escape, had a hole hammered in his skull and was unconscious for two days. With a war club and axe, his arm and collarbone were broken. While recovering from these wounds, Simon was saved by his long time friend Simon Girty who convinced the Shawnee to adopt Simon as one of their own. Finally in June 1779 Simon was sent to Fort Detroit as part of a prisoner trade with the British. Simon escaped and after a 30 day march he made it back to the American settlements in newly formed “Kentucky.”

Perhaps the most poignant moment of his life came during the War of 1812.

During the War of 1812, he participated in the Battle of the Thames. It was in this battle that the mighty leader of the Shawnee, Tecumseh, was killed. Simon was asked to identify the body so the pathetic whites could scalp and ravage every part of his body for souvenirs. Knowing this ahead of time, Simon falsely identified Tecumseh so his body would remain for his people to find and honor his life and people with a proper burial.

Local people have not forgotten Simon Kenton.

I learned about Simon Kenton by reading local author Allan W. Eckert‘s fantastic book, The Frontiersmen.  If you are at all interested in the colonial frontier era, I highly recommend this book.  It is history that reads like a novel.

 

Summer’s Flowering Vines.

Field & Hedge Bindweed

Wild Potato Vine

Virgin’s Bower

Morning Glories

I haven’t talked about plants for a while, so this post is overdue.  In the summer, Ohio has some showy flowering vines- some of them abundant and easy to spot, either in your garden as a commercial variety or sometimes persistently invading your garden.

First of all- what is a vine?

A vine displays a growth form based on long stems. This has two purposes. A vine may use rock exposures, other plants, or other supports for growth rather than investing energy in a lot of supportive tissue, enabling the plant to reach sunlight with a minimum investment of energy. This has been a highly successful growth form for plants such as kudzu and Japanese honeysuckle, both of which are invasive exotics in parts of North America. There are some tropical vines that develop skototropism, and grow away from the light, a type of negative phototropism. Growth away from light allows the vine to reach a tree trunk, which it can then climb to brighter regions.

The vine growth form may also enable plants to colonize large areas quickly, even without climbing high. This is the case with periwinkle and ground ivy. It is also an adaptation to life in areas where small patches of fertile soil are adjacent to exposed areas with more sunlight but little or no soil. A vine can root in the soil but have most of its leaves in the brighter, exposed area, getting the best of both environments.

The evolution of a climbing habit has been implicated as a key innovation associated with the evolutionary success and diversification of a number of taxonomic groups of plants.

I’ve discussed a couple of other vines before; Wild Grape and Poison Ivy, neither of which has spectacular flowers…unlike the vines I’ll point out today.

Now, back to our Ohio summer focus.

Bindweed can be found both out in the country and in the city.  It is quite hardy and very numerous.

Bindweed comes in two basic varieties- Field and Hedge.  It gets started in May, and is abundant throughout the summer months.

Field Bindweed grows in waste areas, especially dry soil.  It is a short vine with small white flowers, often seen along paths or roads.

Hedge Bindweed is a longer vine that typically grows in thickets and upon fences and other plants, and produces a larger white flower.  It can be mistaken for Morning Glory.

The easiest way to identify Bindweed is to look at the leaves- they are narrow and arrowhead-shaped:

These vines are very persistent and are often seen as a pest (though a pretty one).

This is an adaptable vine, preferring full to partial sun and moist to mesic conditions. It tolerates poor soil, often flourishing in areas that are gravelly or sandy. Hedge Bindweed readily climbs a trellis, fences, and neighboring plants, while in open areas it sprawls haphazardly across the ground. The climbing ability is the result of the stems twining tightly about slender objects. This vine can spread aggressively and become a nuisance in some locations. It is known to produce allelopathic chemicals that inhibit the growth of other plants.

Occasionally you will run across pink and white Bindweed flowers, such as the one pictured above.  Otherwise, it is mostly a white flower.

Speaking of white flowers, there is another less-common vine seen in the summer that fits that description.

This is Wild Potato Vine, also known as Wild Sweet Potato.  I usually see it along wood edges.  Its vine is very long.

Two ways to identify this vine are evident in the above picture.  It has heart-shaped leaves, and its white flower always has a purple throat.  The name of this plant comes from its tuber-like roots, which Native Americans ate.  Many varieties of insects pollinate its flowers.

Another vine that I don’t see much of is Virgin’s Bower.  It has distinctive small white flowers.  I’ve seen it in woody areas.  I’d like to see it more often.

Lastly, Morning Glories are both abundant and well-known.  They bloom in the last half of summer, and they are hard to miss out in the country.

Common Morning Glory was introduced into North America from South America as an ornamental plant. Plants with purple flowers appear to naturalize most often. Habitats include fields, roadsides, gravelly areas along railroads, fence rows, and waste areas. Relatively open areas with a history of disturbance are preferred. This plant is still widely cultivated in gardens and around yards. Depending on the habitat, a population of naturalized plants can be either fairly persistent or ephemeral.

Perhaps the best-known feature of Morning Glories are their beautiful vibrant colors.  Sure, they come in white like the other vines we’ve seen, but they also have varying shades and combinations of violet, blue, red and pink.

Notice too that the leaves are more rounded.

One of my favorite things to do in late summer is to drive along agricultural fields and see all of the Morning Glories climbing through the corn.  It is an impressive color show.