Scientist finds rare plant last seen in New Jersey 100 years ago

Scott Fallon | NorthJersey

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The last time a piece of stalked woolgrass was seen in New Jersey, women were protesting for the right to vote, Babe Ruth was pitching for the Boston Red Sox and tens of thousands of American troops were boarding steamships in Hoboken en route to Europe to fight in World War I.

That changed on July 25 when a botanist with the state Department of Environmental Protection discovered the plant along the Delaware River in Warren County, officials said Monday. The last sighting of the plant in New Jersey was on July 4, 1918.

"It underscores the importance of never giving up hope of discovering new locations of our rarest species," said Ray Bukowski, assistant commissioner for natural and historic resources.

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Like many rare plants in New Jersey, stalked woolgrass was never considered extinct by state officials as long as the habitat that supports the plant still existed — in this case marshes and shores of rivers. So it was listed as endangered even though it had not been documented in the Garden State in more than a century.

Tall and grasslike with a fluffy plume, the plant is part of the sedge family and can be found throughout northeastern North America.

In New Jersey, stalked woolgrass is the rarest relative of 11 other species of woolgrass that grow in the state, having been observed only once before, by Edwin B. Bartram, a member of the Philadelphia Botanical Club, in 1918.

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The plant was rediscovered July 25 by botanist David Snyder, who was near the Delaware River shoreline just north of Worthington State Forest on one of his many excursions looking for rare plants.

It started to rain hard. The river was flooding. And Snyder was thinking of calling it a day when he spotted a plant sticking out of the water that looked different from all the common grasslike plants.

It had the color of a manila envelope much different from the darker tone of other sedges. In the pouring rain, Snyder realized he had found a plant that had eluded him for 35 years.

"I've been looking for this plant since the early '80s so it was pretty exciting to find," he said.

He was able to snag part of the plant's flowering head and positively identified it at home with the help of some botany books and online photos.

Snyder returned to the area five days later. After searching a quarter-mile of the shore, he found four clumps of stalked woolgrass.

“The reason it hasn’t been found is that nobody had been going out looking for it," said Snyder, of the New Jersey Natural Heritage Program, which catalogs rare plant and animal species. "Unless the habitat is destroyed, there’s probably a 50-50 chance that it’s there.”

Snyder has become something of a plant detective in New Jersey. During and before his career with the DEP, he has rediscovered more than 100 plant species previously considered “lost” from the flora of New Jersey.

Rutgers Professor Lena Struwe called the discovery amazing, especially since stalked woolgrass often grows several feet tall. Why it wasn't seen in a century is a mystery, she said.

"Botanists rediscover plants, but this is unusual because it's been 100 years," said Struwe, a professor in two departments including Plant Biology.

"It's amazing because this is also a substantial plant," she said. "It’s not like something tiny you'd find under your car or would need a microscope to see. This is a plant that won’t go unnoticed."