Holland has its tulip fields, but there are few places anywhere that offer as much floral splendor as Athens Conservancy’s Bluebell Preserve in mid-April. Located along the Hockhocking Adena Bikeway, the forest floor is a sea of Virginia bluebells, great white trilliums, blue-eyed Mary, and many other native wildflowers.
The superb display is easily viewed from the bikeway. For maximum diversity of wildflower species, consider parking where Glen Ebon Rd. (Co. Rd. 4) crosses the bikeway. There is space for about five cars. From there, walk southeast and you will pass through Athens Conservancy’s Poston Preserve and Wayne National Forest land before reaching Bluebell Preserve.
Wildflower viewing is excellent the entire way, but you must walk about 1.7 miles before you reach large patches of bluebells (between bikeway mile markers 11.5 and 12.0). If your priority is seeing the bluebells, it is a little shorter walk (1.5 miles) to park at the Beaumont-Salina trailhead on Lemaster Road (Twp. Rd. 246) and walk northwest. Before reaching the bluebells, you will be treated to the sight of thousands of trilliums that adorn the slope to your left, on private land.
Some of the most common or conspicuous species include three trilliums (great white [T. grandiflorum], toadshade [T. sessile], and drooping [T. flexipes]), Jacob’s-ladder (Polemonium reptans), wild blue phlox (Phlox divaricata), blue-eyed Mary (Collinsia verna), Dutchman’s breeches (Dicentra cucullaria), squirrel corn (Dicentra canadensis), bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis), sharp-lobed hepatica (Anemone acutiloba), large-flowered bellwort (Uvularia grandiflora), and wild ginger (Asarum canadense).
You may also see a few garlic-mustard plants, in spite of the decades-long efforts by many volunteers to pull out this invasive species. If you are sure you can recognize it, please pull it out but don’t leave it on the pavement because the decaying foliage becomes slippery and hazardous to bikeway users. (see related story on our website)
To avoid trampling the wildflowers, please stay on the bikeway or its grassy margin.
–Phil Cantino (photo by John Lohse)