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The Plymouth Gentian (photo from the collection of the Nova Scotia Museum of Natural History)
The Pink Tickseed (photo from the collection of the Nova Scotia Museum of Natural History; photo blelow by Peter MacDonald)
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Wilsons Lake, Yarmouth County designated a "Special Place" by the province of Nova Scotia.
A grouping of Plymouth Gentian flowers (photo from the collection of the Nova Scotia Museum of Natural History). |
Rare, Rarer,
Rarest! by Sandra Phinney
Two of these rare plants are: the Pink Tickseed (Coreopsis rosea) and the Plymouth Gentian [Sabatia kennedyana]. The Pink Tickseed - related to the dandelion - is rather inconspicuous. Its delicate flowers are usually pale pink to white and its leaves are slender and uniform in shape. It grows between 20 and 60 centimeters high. The Plymouth Gentian, on the other hand, can take your breath away with its fragrance and beauty. It sports large pink petals and showy yellow centres tinged with red edges. This wild beauty stands about 40 centimeters tall.. These plants are part of the coastal
plain flora, a collection of over 60 unique wet-land plants that grow in
bogs, along cobblestoned shores, in fens and swampy areas. The existence of these wild flowers was first documented in 1920 by a world-renown Harvard University botanist, M.L. Fernald. He led a series of Gray Herbarium expeditions to Nova Scotia, and subsequently published detailed accounts of these excursions in Rhodora, the Journal of the New England Botanical Club. These articles make for interesting reading as they are full of vignettes, and sparkle with Fernald's joy of discovery. In one poignant section, Fernald notes with some irritation how - as their train left the Tusket station on the return trip to Yarmouth - a member of their party witnessed a woman holding a bunch of the so-called Plymouth Gentian, "the most beautiful wild flower of the Cape Cod region." Alas, the train moved away and it was too late to ask the lady any questions. He notes both his frustration with the experience, and how the sight of the unexplained flower haunted them, adding: "We could not drive it out of our minds." Serendipity steps in. A few day later, the group decides to stop at Vaughn Lake for a short break en route to Carleton. Fernald writes: "Tiring of waiting for the others to return, I pushed idly though the bushes to the water's edge and there, with flowers fully expanded under several inches of water, was the beautiful Plymouth Gentian." Imagine that! The Plymouth Gentian and Pink Tickseed collected from Yarmouth county, [including the samples from the 1920-21 expeditions] are now permanently housed at the E.C. Smith Herbarium at Acadia University, Wolfville, Nova Scotia. For years, the Plymouth Gentian and the Pink Tickseed were thought to be extinct, disappearing with the construction of hydro dams in the Tusket region of Yarmouth County. In 1979, however, botonist Paul Keddy wrote an article entitled Endangered Wild Plants of Nova Scotia. It appeared in the June edition of Nova Scotia Conservation. Ironically, in the process of writing his article, Keddy was contacted by a friend, who had located some of the rare plants in Yarmouth county. Keddy wrote, "It appears we have been given a second chance." Keddy has devoted his entire working life to the study and preservation of the coastal plain flora. Mil Nickerson, founder and past president of the Tusket River Environmental Protection Association [TREPA], recalls...: "It was in late summer of '86 when we were first made aware of the presence of those rare and endangered species on the Tusket River." Keddy contacted TREPA in the hopes the organization would initiate a campaign to protect the wildflowers. TREPA quickly took up the cause, adopting the Plymouth Gentian for a logo. A committee was struck to develop a stewardship plan with the ultimate goal to have part of the Tusket River area designated a nature reserve.
Three years ago, the Bowater Mersey Pulp and Paper Company, Liverpool, donated 26 acres of land bordering Gilfillan Lake, to TREPA's care. "This was significant, as the second largest plantation of the Plymouth Gentian is located there," Nickerson notes. TREPA named this area the C.R.K. Allen Nature Reserve in recognition of one of its beloved members, Charlie Allen, a revered field naturalist. Both the Plymouth Gentian and the Pink Tickseed maintain limited seed banks, making recovery attempts from habitat disturbances difficult. All-terrain vehicles have destroyed some of the habitat. Cottage development, bulldozing, and other forms of shoreline modification [raking, building wharves, removing rocks] have had a negative impact on plant populations. But good things continue to happen. There is now a
coordinated effort whereby a number of organizations work in concert to develop a
conservation strategy - the Atlantic Coastal Plain Flora Conservation/Recovery Team. The team is made up of conservationists from the Nova Scotia Museum of Natural History, Nova Sotia Power, TREPA, the Nova Scotia Department of Natural Resources, the E.C. Herbarium at Acadia, and scientific advisors from the University of Ottawa and Mount St. Vincent University. They are very pro-active in their approach and results are both significant and encouraging. Ad to this, substantial efforts by the Nova Scotia Nature Trust - and the fact that the Provincial Endangered Species Legislation became law past December - and all augers well for the future of these precious plants. Sandra Phinney is freelance writer living in Yarmouth County, Nova Scotia.
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When you hear the
words "rare" or "endangered species", thoughts turn to dwindling
populations of grizzly bears, bottle-nose whales and bald eagles. Chances are, innocuous
wildflowers wouldn't enter the picture. The fact of the matter is, Nova Scotia is home to
countless varieties of rare, flowering plants. For some of these plants, the entire
Canadian population is found right here. For a handful of these species, they are found in
one area, and one area only - the Tusket River Valley in Yarmouth County, Nova
Scotia.
They are obscure, and unknown to
most people. The theory is: during the last ice age, when the water levels were low, there
was a continuous land bridge from Cape Cod to the southern tip of Nova Scotia. These
plants likely migrated, following the retreating ice, until they settled here. As the ice
melted, the sea levels rose and the plantations were cut off or isolated from the main
range.
Tumbling into place to lend
support, were members of the Nature Conservancy of Canada, and the Provincial Department
of Natural Resources. Wilsons Lake, Yarmouth County with its population of coastal plain
flora, soon became the first area in Nova Scotia to be designated as a "Special
Place", under the Special Places Protection Act. 
Carol Jacquard, a devoted field naturalist and TREPA member,
serves on the team. Ms. Jacquard feels the development of a plan to protect and recover
these species is timely and effective. "If these plants disappear, it would be a very
special part of our history that would go too," she says.
