Canoe Country Flora

Plants and Trees of the North Woods and Boundary Waters

2003
Author:

Mark Stensaas

Mark ‘Sparky’ Stensaas has created one of the most user-friendly nature guides seen by humans, bears or mosquitoes.

Rochester Post-Bulletin

The vast North Woods, a land magnificently arrayed in the deep greens of pine, spruce, and fir and the brilliant blues of crystal clear lakes, spans the area from Minnesota to Maine and from Michigan to Hudson Bay. With a little help from Canoe Country Flora, keen explorers will discover a world full of life and wonder in the plants that thrive in this beautiful lake country.

Canoe Country Flora, a friendly field guide, introduces you to ninety-six of the most common trees, shrubs, wildflowers, fungi, ferns, lichens, and other plants you’re likely to encounter during your travels north. Detailed line drawings and brief plant profiles help you recognize what you’re seeing, while “Sparky” Stensaas’s intriguing tales draw you into a deeper study of the plants’s natural and cultural histories.

Each plant is made identifiable and memorable by fascinating facts, handy checklists, diagrams and charts, and interesting activities that help adults and children learn by discovery.

Use this book as a companion to Canoe Country Wildlife or alone as your guide to a unique North Woods adventure.

Mark “Sparky” Stensaas is the buyer and marketing director for Duluth Pack. Formerly a ranger for the National Park Service, biologist for the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, stuntman for Walt Disney, and pizza deliverer, he currently freelances as naturalist for the Smithsonian Institution, Wilderness Inquiry, The Nature Conservancy, various six-grade classes, and just about anyone who will listen. Sparky now lives in a one-room cabin he built on five acres of white pines in Carlton County, Minnesota. Stop by for coffee.

Mark ‘Sparky’ Stensaas has created one of the most user-friendly nature guides seen by humans, bears or mosquitoes.

Rochester Post-Bulletin

Stensaas has created an absorbing, practical field guide. This book is guaranteed to enrich many of your wildlife encounters and satisfy the curious naturalist and the northern traveler.Upbeat, easy to read, and stuffed full of interesting anecdotes and local folklore/Ojibwa stories, habitat and behavior observations.

Woodswomen News

C O N T E N T S

Trees
Shrub:
Balsam Fir
Black Spruce
Tamarack
Jack Pine
Red Pine
White Pine
Northern White Cedar
Paper Birch
Quaking Aspen
Pin Cherry
Juneberries
American Mountain-Ash
Black Ash
Sweet Gale
Beaked Hazel
Speckled Alder
Labrador-Tea
Leatherleaf
Bearberry
Lowbush Blueberry
Prickly Wild Rose
Red Osier Dogwood
Mountain Maple
Wildflowers
Bullhead Water-Lily
Fragrant White
Water-Lily
Marsh Marigold
Red Baneberry
Wild Columbine
Pitcher-Plant
Round-leaved Sundew
Wintergreen
Creeping Snowberry
Small-fruited Bog
Cranberry
Pipsissewa
Pyrolas
One-flowered
Wintergreen
Indian-Pipe
Starflower
Wild Strawberry
Wild Raspberry
VI
Wildflowers
Thimbleberry
Fireweed
Common Evening
Primrose
Bunchberry
Eastern Dwarf Mistletoe
Wild Sarsaparilla
Harebell
Twinflower
Large-leaved Aster
Spotted Joe-Pye Weed
Broad-leaved Arrowhead
Clintonia
Rose Twisted Stalk
False Lily-of-the-Valley
Wild Iris
Pink Ladyslipper
Spotted Coralroot
Ferns and Other
Nonflowering
Plants
Ferns
Bracken Fern
Rock Polypody
Sensitive Fern
Ostrich Fern
Cinnamon Fern
Interrupted Fern
Royal Fern
Clubmosses
Ground-Cedar
Round-branched
Ground-Pine
Stiff Clubmoss
Shining Clubmoss
Running Clubmoss
Horsetails
Wood-Horsetail
Field-Horsetail
Water-Horsetail
Mosses
Sphagnum Mosses
Lichens
British Soldiers
Pixie Cups
Old Man's Beards
Rock Tripes
Reindeer Lichens
Fungi
FlyAmanita
Birch Polypore
Birch Conk
Yellow-red
Gill Polypore
Gem-studded Puffball
Giant Puffball
Conifer False Morel
Orange Jelly
KingBolete
Golden Chanterelle
Black Knot
Straight-branched Coral
Emetic Russula

Appendix
North Woods Flora
Habitat Finder
Wildflower Bloom
Phenology

Glossary
Plant Diagrams

Index