A Walk in the Park -- Carolina Beach State Park to be Exact!

As most of my ducks have gone back north and my sea birds have disappeared also, I decided to take my walk today down at Carolina Beach State Park.  How cool is it that I live on an island that has state parks at either end (Ft. Fisher is at the other end where I walk about half the time)!!  

Within a 70 mile radius of Wilmington NC, are the only native Venus Flytraps and one of the trails in the park is supposed to have these plus other carnivorous plants.  The soil down here is very poor and acid.  As usual I didn't spot any Flytraps but did see this gorgeous Yellow Pitcher Plant (another carnivorous plant).  The picture does not do it justice as it is about two and a half feet high and the flowers are brilliant yellow.  I had seen the plant before but never in bloom anywhere!  What a treat.

Not a very good picture, but this is another carnivorous plant -- the Bladderwort which is just tiny tiny and grows in the water.  Flytraps are very small as well and hard to spot.  It may be too early in the season as well.

This was blooming all over and I think is Fetterbush but may be wrong.  There were two flowers that looked very much alike but some were white and these were pink. 

This is the white version and I believe this is Staggerbush..  Their leaves looked very similar.  I am getting a wildflower book which will hopefully help me along here. 

I haven't seen ferns before that have these brightly colored spikes of orange.

I couldn't resist taking a number of pictures of the swamp area at the end of the path.  After a couple of days of pretty awful (for here) cloudy windy days, it was back to our expected gorgeous days!  I loved the juxtaposition of light and dark in the swampy area.

This is a closeup of the Yellow Pitcher Plant