HCC Conservation Forum

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In keeping with the designation of May as American Wetlands Month, the Native Plant Society of Texas chose as the theme for its Spring 2024 members’ magazine “Wet and Wild: Diving into the Underworld of Aquatic Plants.” To grace the magazine’s cover, the Society selected a photo of American Lotus (Nelumbo lutea) in bloom in Lake Miller. This is a place where many of us have paddled, and it is fitting that the photo was taken during a 2022 Houston Canoe Club outing.

You can view the original photo along with others of native plants at https://npsot.smugmug.com/Photo-Contests/2023-Photo-Contest/All-Photo-Entries/i-jkwKXfk.

Learn more about American Wetlands Month at https://www.epa.gov/wetlands/may-american-wetlands-month

Photo by Tom Douglas?

Flowering wetland plants such as lizard’s tail, pickerel weed, and American Lotus were a major feature of the June 5, 2022 trip to Lake Charlotte/Lake Miller/Mud Lake. There are photos of the flowers in the trip report, and excellent photo albums including them were posted by Joe Coker and Kent Walters. Our 14-person group paddled through a huge raft of American Lotus plants on Lake Miller, and almost everyone took pictures of them. The one that appears on the magazine cover was taken by the trip leader, Tom Douglas.

Incidentally, that trip report also describes an unusual encounter between an alligator and Kent Walters’ kayak paddle.