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| The trout-lily blooms all across Waupun Park Maple Forest in spring. |
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| Waupun Park Maple Forest Trail aerial map. Click map for larger version. |
The 1.6-mile round trip Waupun Park Maple Forest Trail heads first through the Waupun County Park then then enters the northernmost section of the Waupun Park Maple Forest State Natural Area, which is where you'll find the wildflowers and giant trees.
To reach the trailhead, from Waupun take County Road MMM north. After crossing the South Branch Rock River, the road enters Waupun County Park. Park in the second/northernmost of the two lots.
A trail heads northwest through the county park on a concrete sidewalk. In the woods, it veers right and arches northeast through the county park near the campground's north side. Once past the campground, it enters the state natural area, cutting across its northern side.
Old-growth forest
The state natural area is a remnant of an old sugar maple-oak forest that once covered about 3.4 million acres of southern Wisconsin. As the trees here missed the lumberjack's ax, many are more than a 150 years old and so quite large, often well over two feet in diameter.
Sugar maple dominates, but several other mature trees can be spotted here, including basswood, black walnut, red oak, white ash, and white oak. All fill the canopy. As the northwestern portion of the state natural area is drier, more oaks, including black oak, can be found there than in the rest of the site.
The mid-canopy trees are fairly small. They include bitternut hickory, black cherry, eastern hop-hornbeam, and slippery elm.
Thanks to the mature sugar maple, the understory is absent of shrubs. This creates prime real estate for several wildflowers to flourish.
Trout-lily, Jack-in-the-pulpit
Most impressively, in late-April, there are areas where white trout-lily practically covers the forest floor. On each stalk is a hanging yellow flower, about an inch wide, with three petals and three petal-like sepals that curve backward. It can be found across Wisconsin but typically only grows in the southern two-thirds of the state.
Beyond that, the forest is also home to plenty of other beautiful wildflowers, including Jack-in-the-pulpit, meadow-rue, toothwort, Virginia water-leaf, red and white baneberry, wild-blue phlox, bloodroot, blue cohosh, may-apple, sharp-lobed hepatica, spring-beauty, violets and wood anemone.
Jack-in-the-pulpit blooms in spring. Its erect 2- to 3-inch long flower sits inside a green or purple hood at the top of a single stalk. American Indians cooked its below ground stem as food, so it's sometimes referred to as Indian turnip. The plant contains calcium oxalate crystals, however, so no part of it above ground is edible, as it causes a burning sensation in the mouth.
Meadow-rue is ephemeral, flowering in late April to early May before the tree canopy's leaves grow large enough to block out the sunlight. The flowers are pendant shaped. Each flower has either only male parts (stamens) or female parts (pistils), and each plant bears only male or female flowers. The flowers have five to seven green sepals but no petals since they rely on wind, instead of attracting insects, to pollinate. Meadow-rue is found in all but eight Wisconsin counties, with most of those in the state's Northwoods.
Otherworldly baneberry
Cut-leaved toothwort blooms early in spring before the leaves in the tree canopy can grow large enough to block sunlight. Each white or pale lavender flower has four petals and is a mere half-inch across. The flowers grow in groups of three to 15 per stem. The plant hosts the Checkered White butterfly caterpillar.
Virginia water-leaf blooms in spring. Each white to light blue flower is tiny, a miniscule quarter- to a half-inch long, and consists of five petals fused in a bell shape. The flowers blossom in clusters. The forb grows in large mats across the woodland floor, as their underground roots shoot up through the ground and form new plants. It is found across Wisconsin except the state's northern boundaries.
Red baneberry blooms in spring. Its teensy white flowers, each a mere quarter-inch wide, form a dense round cluster that can be up to three-inches wide. The flowers produce red berries that cause extreme illness if eaten. The plant grows 8-24 inches high and is common throughout Wisconsin.
White baneberry is nearly identical to red baneberry - blooms in spring and has small white flowers that form a dense ball. After the flower produces its fruit is when the plant gets interesting. The white berries, each with a black spot that creepily looks like doll eyes, sit at the end of red stems, appearing truly alien in the green woods. Its berries are poisonous as well. The forb is found throughout the state.
Phlox, mayapples
Wild blue phlox, also known as wood phlox, usually blooms around Mother's Day. Quite fragrant, it prefers dappled sunlight. Each five-petaled purple flower is about an inch across; sometimes their color can be white or dark blue. Phlox grows throughout southern Wisconsin.
Among the first of the wildflowers to bloom here in spring is bloodroot. Sometimes it pops up from soil that has just thawed. It sports a large white flower, about 1.5 inches wide, with 8-10 petals and a yellow center. The red orange juice in its stem has been used over the centuries as a dye and an insect repellent. It grows all across Wisconsin.
Often blooming near the white trout-lily is the blue cohosh, a one- to three-foot high bush. A cluster of yellow-green flowers with six petals sits atop the plant, which grows throughout Wisconsin. Don’t eat its blue berries, which are poisonous.
Another spring wildflower in the woods is the mayapple. Its waxy white flowers consists of six to nine petals. It’s sometimes called the umbrella plant because the leaves form an umbrella shape that shades the flower. The mayapple grows in the state's southern half.
Mayflowers, violets
Among the first wildflowers to bloom is the sharp-lobed hepatica. It keeps its leaves through the winter and when spring arrives in spring arrives quickly blooms before the trees above it have a chance to grow leaves that shade it out. Its flowers consist of five to nine petal-like sepals that range from pale blue to lavender, pink or white. Each flower is just a half-inch to an inch wide. Sharp-lobed hepatica grows across Wisconsin but is more common in the southern half; its cousin, the round-lobed hepatica, is more common in the northern half.
Carolina spring-beauty blooms from April to June. Each of its half-inch wide flowers consists of five white petals with pink-purple veins. It’s very common in New England, the Appalachians, and Michigan's Upper Peninsula. In Wisconsin, it grows mostly in the northeast, on the north side of a line from Bayfield to Door counties.
Another wildflower found here is wood violet, also known as a common blue violet, which is Wisconsin’s state flower. Ranging in color from deep violet to lavender, the flower consists of five distinct petals with three veined lower petals, and measures about an inch wide. The flowers usually grow on their own stalk and stay beneath the plant’s heart-shaped leaves. The latter is high in vitamins A and C, and should you ever be lost in the woods with no food, know that they can be eaten raw.
The wood anemone, also called the mayflower, also blooms in spring here. It bears a single white flower, about an inch wide, with five petal-like sepals rising above the leaves. Wood anemones with flowers are older than those without; sometimes the plant doesn’t flower until it reaches five years old. It grows throughout Wisconsin.
Late spring flowers
As the weather warms, blooms of large-flowered trillium and wild geranium pop up.
Among the state’s prettiest wildflowers, the large-flowered trillium's blossom consists of three white, wavy petals that are two to four inches wide. The flower turns pink with age. Ants carry their seeds to underground homes but strangely enough don’t eat them, allowing the wildflower to spread. The large-flowered trillium is found all across the state and is a protected species.
Wild geranium is lavender to purple in color and has heavily veined five petals about 1-2 inches wide. Colonies in natural woodland openings are formed from long-lived clones of an individual plant. Wild geranium grows all across the state.
As enjoying the wildflowers and majestic trees, you may hear some strange sounds above. If it sounds like yodeling and is spring or summer, it's probably sandhill cranes flying to the nearby Horicon National Wildlife Refuge.
The trail doesn't quite reach County Road MMM but ends in the woods. Once the dirt path peters out, retrace your steps back to the parking lot.
Avoid walking off the trail across the forest floor, as this can trample delicate plants. Be sure to carry insect repellent.
