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Stutsmanville Bog - Howard Crum, July 1999
Stutsmanville Bog is developed at the margins of a small, hard-bottomed lake poor in minerals but
rich in oxygen. Productivity is limited because of mineral deficiency, and an abundance of oxygen causes
a near-complete decomposition of plant remains. The result is a narrow, scarcely floating mat. Zonation
from open water to black spruce muskeg is telescoped. At the water's edge is a narrow fringe of sedgesCarex limosa, Rhynchospora alba (White Beak Rush), and Eriophorum virginicum (Tawny Cotton Grass)mingled with Chamaedaphne calyculata (leatherleaf) and Vaccinium macrocarpon (cranberry) in a mat
of low-growing species of Sphagnum (peat moss). Only a few feet away, among hummock-forming
Sphagna is a scattering of shrubby Andromeda glaucophylla (Bog Rosemary) and Kalmia polifolia (Bog
Laurel) abruptly merging with Picea mariana (Black Spruce) and Larix laricina (Tamarack) with an
understory of Ledum groenlandicum (Labrador Tea). Black spruce continues as an extensive muskeg, but
tamarack drops out owing to shading and mineral deficiency. Throughout the bog complex, from open
water to muskeg, Sphagnum controls the habitat as a water-logged, acid peatland occupied by the few
kinds of plants that can grow there-plants with shallow roots, some of them with mycorrhizae relations.
A few orchids and Drosera rotundifolia (Sundew) are seen in open parts of the bog mat, but few species
occur in the understory of the muskeg, some species of Vaccinium (Blueberries), Gaultheria hispidula
(Creeping Snowberry) and Cypripedium acaule (Stemless Lady Slipper) among them.
In northern lower Michigan the more common bog type develops around mineral-rich lakes
(buffered at neutrality), especially well exemplified by Inverness Mud Lake Bog. The lake water teems
with oxygen-producing algae that support an overpopulation of oxygen-using invertebrates. Oxygen
deficiency results in incomplete decomposition of invertebrate animals and accumulated litter from
marginal vegetation that builds up on a muddy false bottom. The false bottom is close to the surface,
and the sedge mat advances upon it as summer drought sets in. The sedge mat is acidified by Sphagnum
and eventually gives rise to a Sphagnum lawn, followed by a grounded mat made up of a hummockhollow complex covered with Chamaedaphne and "islands" of black spruce. Succession ends with a
muskeg. In such a bog, the zonation is quite distinct.