Pine Creek Barrens in August
Pine Creek is a deeply cut feeder stream of the Salt River, which soon thereafter empties into the Ohio River, southwest of Louisville. Pine Creek itself is located in Shepherdsville… an area with a not quite suburban / rural feel, plenty of forest, and surrounded by knobby terrain with frequent rocky outcrops. The prominent guidebook Wildflowers and Ferns of Kentucky by Barnes & Francis explains that in The Knobs region that borders Louisville to the south and west (through which Pine Creek flows), time-flattened valleys are filled with “deep, rich soils” with various sediments including the rich limestone of the bluegrass region (where all the horses love to eat). Still, forested hills, rich valleys, and remnant plateau escarpments aside, the coolest part of Pine Creek is the rare sandy dolomite glades. As you can imagine, it’s a marvelous place for plant diversity…and the ecological melting pot I’m describing is summed up quite nicely in a brief 3 mile hike. Here’s a few phone shots I took for researching when I got home.
