by Gretchen Lytle
Introduction
During the beautiful fall season, as leaf hues vary and colors shift tones almost day by day, the Bard campus becomes a pictorial landscape. The northern part of campus is especially compelling. Across from the main entrance to the Fisher Center, you will find a contemplative locale for an art installation, a variety of deciduous trees as well as pines, and a splendid central field sporting a crazy quilt of wildflowers and shrubs.
A Place for Contemplation
If you arrive by car, park at the north end of the lot on Robbins Road, just short of and south of the Fisher Center’s front entrance. Right there, you’ll see a variety of leafing trees in a small grove, hopefully in glorious fall colors—yellow hickory leaves, red oak leaves, maples, and flowering dogwoods along with evergreen pines. Behind you and to your right, there is an expansive meadow of wildflowers and shrubs, with a few venerable trees along the edges. Before entering the meadow on its pathways, circle a bit further north to approach the Icelandic-Danish artist Olafur Eliasson’s installation The parliament of reality (2009). Cross the bridge and settle down on one of the large rocks on the island. Look for the goldfish, sometimes few and far between, in the circle of water around you, which itself is encircled with a mass of grasses. Take in your surroundings, shifting position to enjoy both the manmade and the natural, near and far.
Maple Allée
As you depart, walk back between the swooshing, tall grasses and head east up the hillside a bit with an eye towards the maple tree allée along Manor Road. There have been trees lining that road for ages, and Bard continues that tradition, replacing them with younger maples as needed. Their distinctive burnt red and gold colors catch one’s eye at this time of year. There’s a bench near the north end of the allée where you can sit and look west through the trees towards the Catskill mountains.
The Meadow
Head down the slope into the meadow now and walk along the mowed pathways, moving south. Bard is an active participant in a pollinator pathway, which promotes a national plan for corridors of native plants that support the nutrition and habitat of pollinating insects and birds across the country. This meadow is full of native plants. Purple asters and yellow goldenrod attract late-season pollinators as do the tiny and less showy blossoms on the mugwort shrubs. Keep your eyes open for a variety of butterflies and moths as well as bees. Invasives like the eye-popping purple loosestrife attract insects as well. Though its magenta blossoms are beautiful en masse, it can overtake land and wipe out indigenous competitors.
Many wildflowers do more than attract pollinators. Goldenrod, for instance, has medicinal properties. The aboveground parts of goldenrod have been used in traditional medicine to address inflammation. Goldenrod is sometimes confused with another deep gold wildflower, ragweed, which sparks seasonal allergies in some people. However, even ragweed has been used by herbalists and Indigenous peoples as an astringent, laxative, fever reducer, and for other purposes as well. Historically, Roman soldiers put mugwort in their sandals, apparently to address fatigue. St. John the Baptist wore a mugwort belt to deal with stomach pain. Since mugwort is related to ragweed, some people are allergic to it.
Research continues on the medicinal uses of traditional plants, and the results are not clear on side effects nor on effectiveness in addressing a range of issues from depression, anxiety, insomnia, headaches, fertility, and diarrhea. It is a complicated business with traditional plants. A less risky use of wildflowers and bushes is as dyestuffs made from flowers, berries, nuts or roots. Generally, the plants in this field yield dye colors ranging from beige to yellow to brown, with subtle variations in hues and shades.
A Story Walk
When you approach the south entrance to the meadow pathways, you may see the signage for a story stroll that the Bard Nursery School and Children’s Center has set up. Although the primary audience for story walks is young children, it is an activity that may appeal to many of us. What’s better than a good book in the great outdoors? Pause along the way to enjoy the posted illustrations and text from R. J. Palacio’s story book We’re All Wonders, with its message of acceptance of individual differences among us all. The story ends at the base of the magnificent, 200-year-old sycamore tree on the west side of the meadow.
Back to the Start
Continue north from the old sycamore, along the pathway running along the east side of the meadow to return to where you first began your walk, at the north end of the parking area. Some walkers might call this last stretch Mugwort Alley. Wouldn’t Roman legionnaires’ eyes have lit up, coming across this expanse of mugwort, with its promising relief from cramping and fatigue? For us, it’s simply a visual treat.
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