Big Bonita Trail, Ruidoso, New Mexico 081114

Gorgeous day! 70°F partly cloudy. Big Bonita Trail, altitude 9,000 feet

I’m in Ruidoso, New Mexico! It is the rainy season here (monsoon season) and everything is alive and blooming. I love this time of year in the Lincoln National Forest. Plus, NO TICKS!! I’m going to be out there as much as possible, so I’m going to skimp on plant ID and such. I’ll be throwing a bunch of photos your way so get ready.

The trail I chose today is the Big Bonita Trail. I love it because there is a running creek, pine forests, meadows, old mines – pretty much has it all.

Wildflowers – this is a Cinquefoil

Cinquefoil

a bunch of them ; )

Cinquefoils

Big ole polypore. I want to look up what the drops are, but I’ll have to come back to it. I can see some pores and tube like structures underneath.

drops

Lots of these around, Pholiota squarrosoides

squa

A closer look at the scales

sqa scales

Here is another family member.

squasmall

This little beauty is my first sighting of a cauliflower mushroom in the Sparassis family! I almost walked right by it.

Cauli

Gorgeous. It really looks like it could be undersea.

cauliclose

A little garlic/onion family bloom.

onion

Tons of these everywhere! tall and big.

bigyella

The most common pollinators I saw today were in the fly family.

fly

Spikey!

flybutt

These types of Tachinid flies were all over.

fly2

This coral fungus was growing on the same fallen tree as last year. My index finger is in this photo for size reference.

coralfinger

coral

A grouping of small gilled mushrooms.

littlebrowngroup

Wildflowers

purple

Mallow

mallow2

A monarda.

monarda

Firecracker!

firecracker

Monarda.

monarda2

Tiny, violet family.

violet

Pea family

pea

firecracker2

 

orange

 

purplespike

bigyellow

Lichen.

lichen

This lichen looked like it was blooming. I will definitely look this one up, so interesting.

lichenBloom

 

lichenBloom2

Pretty little gilled mushroom

rube

I thought the pattern caused by the growth of this mushroom was pretty.

shroom

Polypore. This was fuzzy and hairy looking. The edges were surprisingly soft and almost glowed.

orangepoly

orangepoly2

Such a beauty.

orangepoly3

Such a common looking gilled mushroom, but the funnel on top caught my eye, the fringed edges are nice too.

funnel

The underside of the above funneled mushroom.

funnelunder

This group was crammed in the crack of a massive tree. Looks like oyster mushroom, but I’d have to look it up.

oystercrack

This bolete has a yellow underside and the top stains red when bruised. Perfect example.

bolete1

Top, notice the spots of bruising that are reddish in color.

bolete2

The underside showing the tubes.

boleteunder

A little sedum!

sedum

A smaller version of the large polypore shown earlier.

dew

Oyster?

oysterish

FERNS!

fern

last but not least, some witches butter

Butter

Such a beautiful hike along the creek.

creekvert

I apologize for blazing through everything. I’m happily worn out and need some sleep!

5 thoughts on “Big Bonita Trail, Ruidoso, New Mexico 081114”

  1. It’s great to see that things seemed to have greened up since we were there on the 4th of July! The creeks seemed mostly dry then. Love the pics as usual.

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