Green helicopters crash
Tuesday, 31 March 2015
Do you know these maple seeds as helicopters? A childhood thing…. Or maybe no longer….
Anyway, these have crashed and are now earthbound….
Musings
Architectural transitions
Monday, 30 March 2015
I walked past the neighbors’ house, and it was a pile of rubble. I think it was felled this morning. I knew this was coming….
Instead of giving you a photo of the slightly depressing hill of random building material, I present this sweet little pastel playhouse.
Mystery in ATL
Sunday, 29 March 2015
ATL is pretty far away from moose* territory…. Is this whimsy in the garden of transplanted Yoopers? Canadians?
* Elk is moose in British English, I “see.”
Or should the title have been “Rusty steel mini-moose”? Or “Migratory moose visits ATL”? Or….
Shine, glorious sun
Saturday, 28 March 2015
The Guru and I braved the cold (relative cold, that is) and joined the hardy souls in H4WP. We saw that the goose-lady has settled on a lake-side nest, and that kind souls have put up a black silt fence to give her some privacy and perhaps near-invisibility from dogs passing by just feet away on the sidewalk.
Actually, the sun was out and we found it very pleasant. Cold warning for overnight tonight, too; I’ve brought in the bowl of daffodils I’m trying to nudge toward blooming (started them late).
Know your blooms
Friday, 27 March 2015
I found the first blooming azaleas of the year—they were super-pink and robust, and the rest of the plant’s buds are not far behind. Elsewhere, though, not even buds…. And this plant isn’t in an especially protected location, either, ah, those mystery beings, plants….
Now that tree, they rarely are larger! Love the weeping cherries! Or is it a plum? I know it’s not a pear or peach….
Apologies, Dear Reader, for the plethora of blooms lately, but ’tis the season…. I keep looking for other subjects, but sometimes they move too quickly, like the ’possum that I’ve seen in the backyard twice in the last two weeks….
Bloomin’ report
Thursday, 26 March 2015
We are in transition, in a blooming transition. The daffodils and their kin are finishing up. The fruit trees are full on, although a few pears are showing some leaf-green. I saw the first dogwood I’ve found that was open all over the tree—so they’re coming. Meanwhile, the petals from trees like this are beginning to become glorious drifts on the ground surface below.
Looping character
Wednesday, 25 March 2015
I think I’ve got a vine sub-theme floating around in the back of my aesthetic brain…. This one is helping create a visual border/fence for this front garden, vertically extending the hard-scaping. Without the colorful blooms—or the green of leaves—the ropy silver stems provide the eye graceful confusion.
Vines are somewhat of a visual irregularity in the plant world. For their size, the main trunk you expect isn’t zooming straight (or nearly so) toward the sun….
Are vines rebel herbage?
Unexpected ABG
Tuesday, 24 March 2015
Back to the ABG* because it was so darned nice out…. Plus, I love to stand under the flowering fruit trees and inhale the rich bloom-perfume, and who’s to say how many more days I can do this? (There’s rain in the forecast….)
Nevertheless, I liked this looping vine for my photo-of-the-day. I think it’s a wisteria, but it is still dormant and I did not look for a label, I was so taken by it appearing to encircle the distant doorway.
And how could I not pass along this lovely anole-in-a-succulent moment?
* Atlanta Botanical Garden, of course….
Quince musings
Monday, 23 March 2015
Lousy photo….
I don’t remember mentioning the quince this spring, but I’ve been enjoying the blooms for weeks, maybe almost two months. I noticed today that it still has new buds, quite a run for this modest shrub.
Have I also mentioned that merely the word quince always takes me back to my childhood neighborhood, and the quince tree in the back yard down the street? We climbed it several times, but preferred the tall pine nearby, even though we got pitch on our hands from it and not the quince. We liked getting up above the roof of the two-story house nearby.
A quick perusal of WikiPee suggests that the quince I climbed and the quince that’s blooming are only distantly related, each belonging to a different genus. The common term “quince” thus deviates from botanical taxonomy.
However, I prefer to keep these two plants I have known linked, and enjoy warm-fuzzies from memories I associate with this particular quince.
Spring colorizing
Sunday, 22 March 2015
Such a great contrast to yesterday’s sunny warmth—today’s misty overcast further nourished many plants…including this lichen….
One fond harbinger of spring in my Midwestern childhood was forsythia…here it is merely one among many showier competitors….