Today is all about the flowers. The ones I drew were all growing on the pipeline, near the top of the hill where our bench sits facing southwest. It was cloudy and very gnatty, the kind of gnats that like to fly into your eyes and ears, which could very well be used as a form or torture. The Yellow-billed Cuckoos were calling from the treetops again today - Cuck-cuck-cuck-cuck-cuck-cuck-cuck-cuck-KALP! KALP! KALP! and the ever present Wood Thrushes.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Pasture Rose, Butterfly Weed, and other May Wildflowers
Today is all about the flowers. The ones I drew were all growing on the pipeline, near the top of the hill where our bench sits facing southwest. It was cloudy and very gnatty, the kind of gnats that like to fly into your eyes and ears, which could very well be used as a form or torture. The Yellow-billed Cuckoos were calling from the treetops again today - Cuck-cuck-cuck-cuck-cuck-cuck-cuck-cuck-KALP! KALP! KALP! and the ever present Wood Thrushes.
Saturday, May 23, 2009
Lupine seedlings from northern California
It's a funny kind of day - warm and humid, the sun is in and out, and a while ago a band of showers passed by and chased me inside. I'd been out wandering around checking out wildflowers on the back road - if you can call it a road. It's no more than the roadbed, and even the clay is washing out into a small gully. The honeysuckle grows thick and is in bloom back there, so the air was heavy with scent. Many non-native wildflowers grow along the road but are lovely anyway: Venus' Looking Glass, Oxeye Daisy, English Plaintain, Queen Ann's Lace, Carolina Cranesbill, Yellow Wood Sorrell, Spotted Cat's Ear, and Common Fleabane, among others not in bloom yet. In the woods heading to the old road was White Milkweed, Euonymus (actually a shrub) and dainty Summer Bluet. A Yellow-billed Cuckoo was calling from a tree above me, and added to the steamy morning made it seem more like a jungle in Africa than South Carolina. Cu-cu-cu-cu-cu-cu-cu-cu-Kalp-Kalp-Kalp! Our resident Wood Thrush sang his lilting, watery song as well. Butterflies: Great Spangled Fritillary, Eastern Tailed Blue, and Red-spotted Purple. I was lucky to see a wild turkey as he (or she) crossed the old roadbed and headed into our woods.
Monday, May 18, 2009
Tulip Tree Silk Moth and Lettered Sphinx
It was sunny, windy and chilly today, a surprise after the warm weather of late. Walked the dogs at midday and tried to avoid the shade, which when walked through felt like stepping back into winter. The wind with sunshine on my face was hard enough until I did some uphill walking and warmed up.
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Deerberry and Persimmon
While exercise hiking on the pipeline today I did my usual looking around to see what I could see. Occasionally, even while exercising and having to concentrate on finding good footing on the trail, something interesting will catch my eye. Today was one of those days. As I was heading up the steep cut-through that runs between clearings I saw a low-bush blueberry blooming, and ticked it off on my "head-list" of blooms for the day: Lance-leaved Coreopsis - check, Ragwort - check, Toadflax - check, Blackberry - check, Pasture Rose - check, Blueberry - check - - - it took about two seconds before my subconscious came through and made me do a double-take. “NOT BLUEBERRY,” it said. Then I remembered. The blueberries around here have not only bloomed, but the ones I studied just yesterday along the edge of our woods already have small green berries. I swiveled on the ball of my foot and walked back to the bush. Another difference was the size and shape of the open, dangling white blooms. First, it was larger, and second, even though the buds were “bell-shaped,” the fully opened flowers were open wide. Blueberry blooms are little bells. Because I was in a hurry (how I hate to be in a hurry!) I snapped off a short piece of a flowering branch and took it home where it waited in a small vase until later in the day, when I (with help from a friend) finally had the time to identify it. We even hiked back to the bush to make sure. It was Deerberry - and yes, it's in the vaccinium family with the blueberries.
On the hike down to the mysterious bush, we passed a tree with many small blooms along the stems, at the base of the leaves. My friend said "Persimmon" and we looked it up, but the small blooms didn’t fit the description in the field guides as being 5/8 “ wide, and solitary. Solitary? These blooms were bunched in threes at the base of the leaves and none of the many blooms on the tree were any larger than about 3/8”. We climbed up the hill to where I know I've seen a fruiting persimmon in the past to see if it was blooming so we could compare the two trees. It was a tall tree so we had to use binoculars to find blooms. Hmm... There's one! my friend said. But... one? Why only one - and it's bigger, isn't it? We discussed it at length, until I finally read far enough into the detailed description to learn that it is the female persimmon tree that has the solitary 5/8" blooms, while the male persimmons are “bunched and only 3/8 inch wide.” Oh! It's a male/female thing! Mystery solved.
We suddenly realized we'd spent over three hours wandering around in the woods. "Almost 6:00? It can't be!" I said. We rushed back to the house so I could clean up enough to go out to dinner at 6:30. On the way we found two more trees behind my house that we couldn't identify, but once again, I was in a hurry. Those trees will have to wait for another day.
So many mysteries, so little time!
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Kidneyleaf Rosinweed
A creek in springtime is a magical place to visit, and little Meetinghouse Creek certainly fit that description today. During my walk I stopped to see if anything was going on down there, and at first thought, "Nah, nothing here." Then I heard a low buzz, and a Whitetail Dragonfly zoomed in and landed on a reed, causing it to bounce and wave for a moment. A Spring Azure butterfly flitted down from uphill and sipped at the wet sand along the creek's edge. Small minnows made themselves known by swimming through a patch of sunlight close to me, and once looking for them, I saw them everywhere, swimming oh-so-leisurely and then suddenly darting off... where to? what's the hurry? I wondered. There were the bright round sun spots on the creek bed that showed the whereabouts of a Water-Strider (barely visible otherwise) as he walked around effortlessly on the water's surface.
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Beard-tongue and Ragwort
It's warm and windy today, with strong gusts that bend the treetops! Wandered on the pipeline looking for a patch of mushrooms I saw yesterday, and as I stood looking down at the spot where they had been a big shadow moved past me on the ground. Looking up I saw a huge red-tailed hawk just as he landed in a nearby pine tree. The small oak in front of the pine had a hole in the branches that framed the hawk perfectly as he preened and fluffed himself up. He was so close I could hear little noises and flutters of wings as he balanced and adjusted his stance. His rusty-red tail glowed in the sun. He finally saw me and flew off his perch with loud flaps. The strong wind buffeted him as he flew across the pipeline and made his flight quite ungraceful.
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Biotite Mica and Other Black Things
Wonderful spring rains today. Storm after storm swept over us, drenching every tree and rock and blade of grass. The sun would shine for a few minutes and tease you into believing it was over, then it clouded up again and BOOM! Boom, boom, boom... another gullywasher.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Morel Mushroom and Sprouting Buckeye
Over the weekend we went to our cabin near Waynesville NC to open it up for the season. It's a tiny place that used to be an apple shed in a long-gone orchard. You can still see occasional apple trees here and there on the hill, and until last fall one of the original, 130 year old apple trees stood guard beside the cabin. It had been failing for years and finally it had to be taken down, but we miss its huge, friendly trunk and waking to the BANG! and roll of the withered fruit it dropped onto our tin roof. There had been a big hole in the trunk that had been home to the imaginary mouse-friend of our 7-year old neighbor, Rose, so a section of the trunk now resides in their garden at the big farmhouse just up from our cabin. The spot where the tree once stood has the darkest, richest soil I have ever seen, with only a foot-long, narrow band of hard applewood that had been holding up the whole tree. We wish we could plant another apple tree but the surrounding oaks, ashes, hemlocks, and cherry trees cast too much shade now. So, yesterday we decided to leave the Christmas Ferns that grew around the base of the tree, add to them and make it into a fern garden.