05 September 2024.
Santa Rosa County, Florida, United States
Locality: Blackwater River Wildlife Management Area: on the south side of Boundary Line Road about 0.32 kilometers west of Deaton Bridge Road along an area edged by a barbed wire fence.
Coordinates: 30.6858, -86.8796
(Map it)
Elevation: 45m.
Georeference protocol: Lat/lon determined by GPS
Habitat: Wild Habitat
Environment description: Plants are growing from part-sun to full sun. Plants are growing in an area that is frequently burned with a lot of [Prunus sp. (orig. listed as Prunus alabamensis)] scattered throughout. This habitat is a longleaf pine-wiregrass community with scattered turkey (Quercus laevis) and blackjack oaks (Quercus incana). There is a slight slope downward. The line of [Prunus sp.] goes along a semi-ditch on the side of a dirt road. The plants probably get a bit more water than the plants out in the open forest. The [Prunus sp.] are most often without any other close woody companions. Slope: 0 percent. Aspect: North. Geology: The underlying geology of this area is probably of lower Pliocene age and characterized as the Citronelle Formation. The Citronelle Formation is widespread in the Gulf Coastal Plain. The type section for the Citronelle Formation, named by Matson (1916), is near Citronelle, Alabama. The Citronelle Formation grades laterally, through a broad facies transition, into the Miccosukee Formation of the eastern Florida panhandle. Coe (1979) investigated the Citronelle Formation in portions of the western Florida panhandle. The Citronelle Formation is a siliciclastic, deltaic deposit that is lithologically similar to, and time equivalent with, the Cypresshead Formation and, at least in part, the Long Key Formation (Cunningham et al., 1998) of the peninsula. In the western panhandle, some of the sediments mapped as Citronelle Formation may be reworked Citronelle. The lithologies are the same and there are few fossils present to document a possible younger age. The Citronelle Formation consists of gray to orange, often mottled, unconsolidated to poorly consolidated, very fine to very coarse, poorly sorted, clean to clayey sands. It contains significant amounts of clay, silt and gravel which may occur as beds and lenses and may vary considerably over short distances. Limonite nodules and limonite-cemented beds are common. Marine fossils are rare but fossil pollen, plant remains and occasional vertebrates are found. Much of the Citronelle Formation is highly permeable. It forms the Sand and Gravel Aquifer of the surficial aquifer system. (Source: USGS Florida Geologic Map Data). Soils: The soil of this area is characterized as Lakeland Series Sand, 0 to 5 percent slopes (21). The Lakeland Series consists of very deep, excessively drained, rapid to very rapidly permeable soils on uplands. They formed in thick beds of eolian or marine and/or fluvio-marine sands in the Southern Coastal Plain MLRA (133A), the Carolina and Georgia Sandhills (MLRA 137), the Eastern Gulf Coast Flatwoods (MLRA 152A) and the Atlantic Coast Flatwoods (MLRA 153A). (Source: California Soil Resource Lab/NRCS Official Soil Series Descriptions). EPA Ecoregion (Level III): Southeastern Plains (65). EPA Ecoregion (Level IV): Southern Pine Plains and Hills (65f).
Number of plants sampled: 3
Associated species: Ilex vomitoria; Baccharis halimifolia; Diospyros virginiana; Pinus palustris; Aristida stricta; Hamamelis virginiana; Quercus minima; Vaccinium elliottii; Vaccinium darrowii; Persea palustris [listed as Tamala palustris]; Quercus laevis; Quercus marilandica; Quercus hemisphaerica; Quercus geminata; Quercus stellata; Ilex opaca; Ilex ambigua; Rhus glabra; Quercus incana; Quercus margarettiae; Vaccinium arboreum; Smilax auriculata; Clinopodium coccineum; Geobalanus oblongifolius; Pityopsis graminifolia.
Comment: Plants are deciduous, multi-stemmed trees with simple, alternate leaves. Despite the dry conditions, the leaves are quite large. This species is locally common, generally infrequent. Seed collected from 3 plants; approximately 250 to 300 seeds collected. Notes: According to comments from Ron Miller, the actual associates of the seed-bearing plant along the road were not typical of the associates of [Prunus sp. (orig. listed as Prunus alabamensis)] plants scattered in the open, continually burned longleaf pine forests. The ditch where it was located was a bit deeper than I remembered, so with the extra water came Quercus hemisphaerica. We paid a good deal of attention to the VERY common plants in the area south of Blackwater State Park. It is very clear that the species is perfectly adapted to the incessantly burned environments. This is not a visitor; that stressed setting is its home. It will occasionally get to be a small tree at the edge of more moist areas where Symplocos tinctoria colonies grow or hardwood thickets remain, but its form there is never straight upward but crooked, asymmetric, and gnarled. Its constant companions in the open are longleaf pine (Pinus palustris), wiregrass (Aristida stricta), turkey oak (Quercus laevis), bluejack oak (Quercus incana), and blackjack oak (Quercus marilandica). Here and there the low running form of Quercus stellata shows up. Constant associates are also Rhus glabra and Diospyros virginiana. Here and there Ilex ambigua and saw palmetto (Serenoa repens) are nearby. Whether the species cannot take moisture or simply cannot compete in wet areas with Ilex glabra and so on, I do not know. But it is never found in moist depressions. Its bark in mature plants seems adapted to burning in the way that the barks of turkey, bluejack, and blackjack oaks are. [Collecting notes prepared by Rick Lewandowski.]
Collector(s):