Written by: Ethan Perry
This winter we got a two-fer. Ever since we started making plant collections a few years ago, to provide specimens for the Olga Lakela herbarium at UMD, we’ve held a plant mounting workshop in the winter. We take the specimens pressed in newspaper in the summer and glue them to large sheets of heavy acid free paper, which preserves them for future scientific study.
This past summer we outdid ourselves with a major collection of flora at Hawk Ridge, led by Paul Hlina. He pressed a total of 252 specimens. We held a mounting workshop in October and tackled a bunch of them, while listening to Paul report the results of his study. But one evening was not enough. So, on Tuesday about 15 of us joined a follow-up session, including those who couldn’t get enough of it the first time, and some who had missed out.
We arranged the plants on the sheets in a pleasing manner and brushed glue onto one side of them. Heavy washers prevented stems and leaves from lifting off the paper until the glue dried. Some plants, like shrub branches and sedges, are easier to mount with adhesive strips. The stack I worked on included a couple large sedges that I had to wrangle onto the page like roping a steer.
In all we mounted another 75 specimens. A fun time and a great accomplishment, but we still have a number to go.
Learn the results of the volunteer Hawk Ridge Study:
Arrowhead Native Plant Explorers 