The National Landmark designation. Let me tell you, it truly deserves it.

The bog is an unusual habitat, and the plants are really cool. This is a Northern Pitcher Plant (Sarracenia purpurea, Sarraceniaceae).

These plants are insectivorous - the bottom of the pitcher is filled with a solution that breaks down and digests any insects who slide into it. The edge of the pitcher is covered with fine hairs which all point down into the pitcher. When an insect walks across the hairs, they tend to start sliding down. An interesting note is that the only mosquito species in the bog actually lays its eggs in the liquid in these pitchers... no idea how they survive, but they do.

Another plant that grows out of the peat mat here is the Pink Lady's Slipper Orchid (Cypripedium acaule, Orchidaceae). Orchids are some of the most complex plants in nature - with some very interesting characteristics.

The pollen of the flower is inside the slipper - a bee will make its way inside, and then discover thet it can't get back out. The way the flower is shaped ensures that the bee will spend the night inside the flower, getting totally coated with pollen. By morning, the flower will have relaxed enough that the bee can finally get out. But here's the catch - having gotten out, that bee never wants to see another one of these flowers. Not the most useful reproductive strategy, but it seems to work to some extent.

(Apologies for the fuzzy picture!) If you've ever seen a photo of a Sundew, the actual plant itself is kind of surprising. This is a Spatulate-leaved Sundew (Drosera intermedia, Droseraceae). Another insectivorous plant, with sticky hairs covering the spatulate leaves. The surprising thing about these is that they're really, really small. I've never read the measurements given below the pictures, and assumed they were maybe 6" across... they're actually more like 2" across.

There is a reason why a true bog has a lot of insectivorous plants. It is a closed system - meaning that it is very rare that any nutrients will make their way in. Most animals don't come anywhere near here because of the acidity (and of course the lack of any other animals), and the plants that grow around the bog in less acidic areas tend to pull any run-off nutrients out for themselves. Insects are one of the few sources of nutrition for the plants here - they catch their own fertilizer as it were.

In the bog, there are areas of open water where the peat doesn't cover the surface. This is one of the plants that grows there - the Bullhead Lily (Nuphar variegatum, Nymphaceae). The flower is almost closed, with just a space around the center open.

After Pinhook, we stopped at another nature preserve on the way back - it was pretty neat, and had woods as well as medium-sized ponds. This is a Dame's Rocket (Hesperis matronalis, Brassicaceae).

Another characteristic of these family trips is that invariably someone will see a flash of color on the side of the road, and we pull off to go take a look. It's amazing the cool flowers you can find this way. This one is a Rough-fruited cinquefoil (Potentilla recta, Rosaceae). Unlike the usual Cinquefoil, this plant is upright and quite tall - these were 2-3'.

Another roadside plant - a Black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta, Asteraceae).

This is the Carolina, or Pasture rose (Rosa carolina, Rosaceae).