Cedar Bog

I'm not sure how Cedar Bog managed to elude me all the years I've been hiking around Ohio, but it had until today. It's located just outside Urbana and it's largest calcareous bog (actually a fen) in Ohio. I learned from Sally, an enthusiastic and knowledgeable guide, that a bog is a geographic formation characterized by standing water while a fen is flushed at least periodically by fresh water and therefore the soil in a fen is richer in nutrients and less acidic than that found in bogs. Cedar Bog was formed when a retreating glacier left a shallow depression in the earth at the end of the last ice age. It is home to several species of plants and animals seldom found elsewhere in Ohio, including the Massasauga Rattlesnake and the endangered Spotted Turtle.

The preserve is protected by the Ohio Historical Society and there is a nearly mile long boardwalk winding through the fen. The plant life is spectacular and there were loads of wildflowers in bloom today, including Jack-in-the-Pulpit, White Trillium, Bent Trillium, Bishop's Cap, Wild Columbine, Golden Ragwort and Starry False Solomon's Seal. I'm already planning another trip in about four weeks when the Showy Lady's Slipper, one of our native orchids, will be in bloom.