Glassy Mountain Heritage Preserve

Nature Connection

(near Pickens, SC)

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Glassy Mountain, as seen from Highway 8 near Pickens, is one of several monadnocks (isolated mountains rising from relatively flat terrain) in the upstate. The top of Glassy Mountain is nearly 400 feet above the farmland below. It is also a good example of an exfoliation dome; bare rock is eroded in layers, much like those of an onion.

A 0.6 mile hiking trail, beginning on Glassy Mountain Road just beyond the intersection of Glassy Mountain Church Road, winds around the east side and rejoins Glassy Mountain Road at the top. There is an old SC Forestry Commission fire tower at the end of the road on top.

The delicate plant community on this dome includes the regionally threatened thousand-leaf goundsel (Senecio millefolium), a woody member of the aster family and a relative of sea myrtle or saltbush (Baccharis halimifolia) found along the coast.

Looking east from Glassy Mountain toward Greenville. Parris Mountain, another much larger monadnock, is barely visible on the horizon.

Plant succession begins with lichen (gray-green), really two plants, a fungus and and alga, living as one. The algal component, about 2%, contains chlorophyll and furnishes food for the lichen through photosynthesis. The fungal component, about 98%, secretes acids that chemically weather rock into soil. As the lichens die as part of their life cycle, the create an organic soil layer. When added to the inorganic layer created by chemical weathering, they produce an environment in which mosses (darker green) begin to grow.

As the soil builds up, other thallophytes and bryophytes, ferns

grasses, shrubs, needle bearing trees, and eventually, deciduous trees complete the cycle of succession. The more I see of the mountains, the more amazed I am at how plants, shrubs and trees manage to survive and grow in such thin layers of soil.

For further information on this and other Heritage Preserve sites, click on the following link to the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources Heritage Preserve Page

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