Plants and Animals
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Plants
This lush natural community supports a diverse array of trees, forming a tall and dense canopy that usually includes black maple and/or sugar maple. In spring, wildflowers that are particularly nutrient-demanding carpet the forest floor.
Canopy Trees
The trees whose crowns intercept most of the sunlight in a forest stand. The uppermost layer of a forest.
- black maple and/or sugar maple
- bitternut hickory
- common hackberry
- red hickory
- white ash
- American basswood (occasional)
Understory Trees
Small trees and young specimens of large trees growing beneath the canopy trees. Also called the subcanopy.
- black maple and/or sugar maple
- pawpaw
- sassafras
- white ash
- flowering dogwood (occasional)
- tuliptree (occasional)
Shrubs, Saplings, and Vines
Shrubs, juvenile trees and vines at the right height to give birds and others a perch up off the ground but below the trees.
- northern spicebush
- pawpaw
Low Plants (Field Layer)
Plants growing low to the ground. This includes small shrubs and tree seedlings.
- blue cohosh
- Canadian wild ginger
- Dutchman’s breeches
- harbinger-of-spring
- squirrel-corn
- toadshade
- twinleaf
- Virginia bluebells
- Virginia springbeauty
- black cohosh (occasional)
- Canadian waterleaf (occasional)
- Canadian white violet (occasional)
- Canadian wood-nettle (occasional)
- Christmas fern (occasional)
- cutleaf toothwort (occasional)
- Jack-in-the-pulpit (occasional)
- mayapple (occasional)
- ramp (occasional)
- yellow trout-lily (occasional)
Non-Native Invasive Plant Species
The rich soils on these slopes beckon many non-native invasive plants, from garlic mustard* to tree-of-heaven*. See Ecological Threats for more.
Animals
Even though natural communities aren’t named after animals, animals do play a crucial role in maintaining natural communities. Plants and animals need each other. To name just a few examples, plants provide food and habitat for animals, and animals help plants reproduce by spreading pollen and seeds. To learn more, see The Role of Animals in Natural Communities in Ecology Basics.
Check out iNaturalist to see photos of animals (and plants!) that people have seen in Harpers Ferry National Historical Park.