flowers — Page 232

After the Flowers Are Gone; What then?

August 18, 2015 at 9:18 am by Claudia

Hazy, hot and humid continues here in our neck of the woods. But that can’t stop me from grabbing the camera to take a few photos.

I wonder every year at this time: what will I do when the seasons change and flower pictures are no longer a possibility? Somehow I manage to find something else to talk about, but right now? I can’t imagine what that would be.

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With a lot of watering, the plants on the Funky Patio are hanging in there.

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Along with at least one of my rose bushes. I cut this one back rather severely and it’s blooming. The one next to it may have to be removed. The jury’s still out on that one.

8-18 teeny moth

Can you spot the teeny-tiny moth on the butterfly bush? So tiny, yet the markings are very complex and detailed. Nature is a wonder.

The Top Secret Project is on a brief hiatus during these very hot days. I can’t work upstairs in my little space because there’s no air conditioning there.

Soon.

Happy Tuesday.

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Gossamer Strands

August 17, 2015 at 8:30 am by Claudia

The area near our culvert is full of wildflowers at the moment. That’s where I’ve been taking the pictures you’ve seen lately. The growth is relatively untamed and it’s easy to ignore it and focus on the garden beds. But, just as the garden beds start to wane in mid-August, the masses of what some would call weeds but I know as wildflowers kick into gear.

It’s sort of fascinating down there. Beautiful flowers, lots of bees and moths, and some rather striking spiders.

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One of the payoffs of taking a macro/closeup picture is the reveal that happens. I couldn’t see those gossamer strands all around this flower with the naked eye, but they were there.

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Bees sampling the goldenrod. And at the end of one of the flowers is a little red speck, which I take to be some sort of bug. Fascinating.

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I spotted two yellow garden spiders. (They have varied names, but this seems to be the most common.)

8-17 yellow garden spider

They’re known for that zig-zag that occurs on the web. Clearly, they’re designers with their own special stamp.

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The other yellow garden spider, just after having spun his strands around some prey. I watched as he did it. He was a whirling dervish. I couldn’t believe how fast he worked.

I guess he needed a rest after all of that.

Happy Monday.

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The Wild Side

August 16, 2015 at 9:00 am by Claudia

Wildflowers are blooming everywhere on the property:

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Yes, I know this is Purple Loosestrife and that it can be invasive. It isn’t invasive on our property. It only grows near the culvert, where water is often flowing on rainy days, and in one other area where there is poor drainage.

And it’s pretty.

This morning, I looked outside the living room window and saw a mother and young fawn walking slowly across the front lawn. I ran for the camera, but was only able to catch the fawn when she was momentarily standing still on the driveway.

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It’s a little blurry, but you can see that she’s a beauty. Then I spent an anxious couple of minutes watching the two of them start to cross the road, then stop and linger in the middle of the road, until they moved on safely to the other side. Thank goodness it was around 6 am and there was very little traffic on the road.

Sigh of relief.

I mowed that lawn yesterday in high temps and high humidity. It took me the rest of the day to recover!

Happy Sunday.

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After the Flowers Are Gone; What then?

Gossamer Strands

The Wild Side

Lambs Like to Party

A Note

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