Garden Flora

In our front yard, we have a large metal livestock feeding tub that we bought a few years ago to grow sunflowers in. Last year I decided to put some gladiolus bulbs and dahlia tubers in it, along with a sprinkling of wildflower seeds. WHAT A SHOW IT WAS!! I was not prepared for the zillions of different wildflowers that bloomed, and took many pictures of which I still have many to share at some point. Then, the deer came by and in one night, ate them all!! Oh well, I couldn't blame them, there was nothing for them to eat, so they went for the flowers. A couple of days ago I went out to take a look at the tub, because it was time to replant the Gladiolus bulbs. I thought I'd just pull all the grass and weeds out, when I noticed a flash of blue! No....a flower??? It hadn't opened yet but I figured it might open today. I went out this morning with my bulbs and some wildflower seeds, and was delighted to see that the flower had opened up to show a gorgeous blue and white face! I pulled out everything else except for a plant that looked promising, piled on some new dirt, replanted the gladiolus, sprinkled wildflower seeds all around, and then went to get my camera and got some pretty pictures! Baby Blue Eyes grow in Oregon, but I've never seen them before and I'm so happy that this grew from the seeds I planted last year! :) From Wikipedia: Baby Blue Eyes is a common annual herb of California, Oregon, and Baja California. It is a spring-blooming wildflower that gets its name from the bright blue flowers of two of the three varieties that are recognised. It is also cultivated in gardens. It can occasionally be found outside its native range as an introduced species, in Alaska, for example. Bernard C. Meltzer (May 2, 1916 – March 25, 1998) was a United States radio host for several decades. His advice call-in show, "What's Your Problem?," aired from 1967 until the mid-1990s on stations WCAU-AM and WPEN-AM in Philadelphia, WOR-AM and WEVD-AM in New York and in national syndication on NBC Talknet. Wikipedia: Bernard Meltzer

We have had extremely crazy weather today, ranging from sunny and breezy to stormy with incredible wind and showers including hail! WOW! I waited all day for the right opportunity to go out, and finally I noticed that the wind had calmed a bit and the sun was out momentarily. I went to our garden and stood for a moment, appreciating the wonderful show that was finally coming to an end. Along with all the daffodils and jonquils that bloom faithfully every year since we moved in, I planted dozens of mixed daffodil bulbs (and others) last fall. So many lovely flowers to enjoy, so many kinds! It was great to see these bright and cheery blossoms, and also a joy to come home from my visit to San Francisco and discover that a few had waited for my return before taking a final bow. The timing could not have been better, with the sun low in the sky, glowing so warmly through the petals. I selected this pair as my favorites and this was my first picture of about a dozen. I think it's interesting that often, my first picture is also the best of the group! I sure do hope you're not all tired of these daffodil pictures, I have yet to show off some of the amazing pictures I got on Daffodil Hill! As well, I have a textured image of the white daffodil in this picture, it's just such a stunning flower! I'll show that in a few days! :) Publius Ovidius Naso (20 March 43 BC – AD 17/18), known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet who is best known as the author of the three major collections of poetry, the Heroides, Amores and Ars Amatoria, and of the Metamorphoses, a mythological hexameter poem. He is also well known for the Fasti, about the Roman calendar, and the Tristia and Epistulae ex Ponto, two collections of poems written in exile on the Black Sea. Ovid was also the author of several smaller pieces, the Remedia Amoris, the Medicamina Faciei Femineae, and the long curse-poem Ibis. He also wrote a lost tragedy, Medea. He is considered a master of the elegiac couplet, and is traditionally ranked alongside Virgil and Horace as one of the three canonic poets of Latin literature. The scholar Quintilian considered him the last of the canonical Latin love elegists. His poetry, much imitated during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, greatly influenced European art and literature and remains as one of the most important sources of classical mythology. Wikipedia: Ovid

Today I spent an hour or two between rain showers to walk around our larger meadow sprinkling somewhere between 5,000-10,000 wildflower seeds here and there. I made sure to only sprinkle them on exposed dirt and some of the larger seeds I pushed into the earth. The thing that's a shame is that these seed are very old. From 2007 to be exact, so I doubt that many of them will sprout. I hope that a few will though, and what a colorful surprise that will be! Tomorrow I'll be sprinkling shade-loving flower seeds around the trees in our smaller meadow and planting a whole bunch of (currently soaking) morning glory seeds near some fencing. Wish us luck! It would be so nice to have some new wildflowers to appreciate! :D It's been raining all day on and off, so I decided to take pictures of the beautiful jonquils which pop up right next to our display of daffodils. They smell sooooo nice!!! Such a strong, sweet smell, I just love them! I also took a picture of our orange-cupped daffodil which fell over last year and needed to be snipped and brought inside for pictures! :) I was so happy to see that now there are TWO of them! :D John Hoyer Updike (18 March 1932 – 27 January 2009) was an American novelist, poet, short story writer, art critic, and literary critic. Wikipedia: John Updike

This is another view of the jonquils I took pictures of today. I originally planned to make this one my pick of the day, but after processing the other picture, I thought the composition was better, the focal point not so centered. Still, this doesn't matter sometimes, and maybe this is the nicer pick...what do you think?

This is the flower that fell over last year, forcing me to snip it and bring it inside for pictures! This year it was able to hold itself up and as a wonderful surprise, another one has popped up behind it! Hooray! :D

Before we moved to this property, previous owners planted a bunch of pretty Grape Hyacinths along the road and I've been enjoying them this year as I always do. Unfortunately I'd been too busy to take their picture until now and I was worried that they would be too far gone to get a nice image. I was really happy to see that even though the bottom blossoms have shriveled up, this image shows how the flowers bloom from bottom to top, with dead ones below, peaking blossoms in the center, and buds still to open at the top! What neat flowers they are! Thomas Stearns Eliot OM (September 26, 1888 – January 4, 1965) was an American publisher, playwright, literary and social critic and "arguably the most important English-language poet of the 20th century". Although he was born an American, he moved to the United Kingdom in 1914 (at age 25) and was naturalised as a British subject in 1927 at age 39. Wikipedia: T.S. Eliot

Today I had a mission! Last year, on April 1, I found a stunning lily on our ridge line, called an Oregon Fawn Lily. You all saw what a Henderson's Fawn Lily looks like, lavender and so beautiful! I had seen pictures of cream-colored Fawn Lilies but didn't find any on our property. But one day I was walking on the ridge line and nearly stepped on one that was growing right on the trail! WOW!! A couple of weeks ago I checked to see when I found that flower so I could plan my walk. Today, while I was making my way towards where I'd found it, I was sure it wouldn't be there. I tried to be realistic but hopeful...it was possible they wouldn't bloom this year or they may have bloomed early. In fact, I got to the spot and to my horror, there was an Oregon Fawn Lily there! Shriveled up and dead. NOOOOOOO!!!!!! However, I wasn't about to give up. I only found one last year but I am much better at finding subjects, and I wasn't worried. Not 30 feet away I found two more, and then many others! HOORAY!! I was surprised at the number that I found, many dozens in the large area that I looked surrounding the first one I discovered. I think these blossoms look like a Cinderella flowers! :) Kahlil Gibran (January 6, 1883 – April 10, 1931) was a Lebanese-American artist, poet, and writer. Wikipedia: B. R. Ambedkar

I was originally going to make this picture my 365, but when I finished the close-up image, this view just didn't seem as showy! Do you prefer this version or the close up? Oregon Fawn Lilies are in the genus, "Erythronium", which includes the beautiful "Henderson's Fawn Lily" that I posted a week or so ago. There are 20-30 species in this beautiful group of perennial plants, and they grow from tooth-like bulbs in forests and meadows throughout the Northern Hemisphere. I was amazed to find that you can purchase bulbs for sale of this species and many others!! Far Reaches Farm: Oregon Fawn Lily For more information about the Erythronium family, Wiki has a concise directory here: Wiki: Erythronium If you would like to know more about this flower, there's a nice source of information here: Oregon Fawn Lily .Here is another very nice page: Oregon Fawn Lily

This is another magnificent magnolia blossom I saw a week ago last Sunday. They are so pretty, aren't they?

Today Steve and I went out to a place called Daffodil Hill in the little town of Shady Cove, Oregon. The road up this hill is lined with daffodil-strewn meadows, and these flowers were everywhere! What a time I had...and well, I came home with over 400 pictures of daffodils alone!! *blush* I've never SEEN so many kinds of daffodils, nor so many at once! This one is my prize, the only one that I saw--I found out it is called a Tahiti Double Daffodil! I don't have time to post any more daffodil pictures today but stay tuned, I'll be adding them as I can in the coming days and weeks! William Wordsworth (7 April 1770 – 23 April 1850) was a major English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with the 1798 joint publication Lyrical Ballads. Wikipedia: William Wordsworth

The other day I mentioned having a dream about the bike ride Steve and I went on last Sunday, I was remembering the shrubs with "1000 yellow butterflies on a branch". Since then I've been dying to get out to take pictures of one of these beautiful bushes, and today we did!! I fell in love with this image, which shows so clearly how these blossoms glow in the afternoon light! I will be posting a picture of the blossom-festooned branches in the future, they're so pretty!!

This is one of the countless, beautiful flowering trees that Steve and I saw today as we drove around taking pictures!

This morning I got some pictures which I was very happy with, so when I took the dogs on a walk around the property, I didn't bring my camera. I was merely looking for tomorrow's subjects, which I found, by the way! Tomorrow will be such fun! However, on the way back to the house, I decided to double back and take a stroll around the Oak tree in our large meadow. This past summer, Steve and I spent many hours planting about 125 bulbs around the tree. Though we hoped they would bloom over the summer, we saw only one flower. Very sad pandas. Today I went to see if there were any flowers popping up and I just about fell over when I saw something bright and blue-purple near the tree. I yelled in delight, "AN ANEMONE!!! WE HAVE AN ANEMONE!!!!! HOORAYYYYY!!!!! Back to the house I bounded, returning with my faithful camera in hand. I restrained myself to a measily zillion pictures, knowing that any more than that would really be too many! :D :D :D I was so surprised to see these pictures on my computer, because the overcast day turned my images into high-key, dramatic pictures which were a wonderful, unplanned surprise! :) Montague Francis Ashley-Montagu (June 28, 1905 – November 26, 1999) was a British-American anthropologist and humanist, of Jewish ancestry, who popularized topics such as race and gender and their relation to politics and development. He was the rapporteur (appointed investigator), in 1950, for the UNESCO statement The Race Question. As a young man he changed his name to "Montague Francis Ashley-Montagu". After relocating to the United States he used the name "Ashley Montagu". Wikipedia: Ashley Montagu

This is a close-up of this remarkable flower's center. Isn't it just stunning?!!! I am beside myself with happiness that our bulb flowers are finally coming up!!

Our daffodils are in full, radiant bloom right now, and the show is just breathtaking!! I've been practicing with getting nice group images for the past week or so, and this morning I hoped I'd get one that was just right. My last attempts the other day were at an angle which looked right when I was taking them but in the end, they were a little bit too high. How nice that I can just step outside to take more pictures! I was so happy that the flowers were still wet from the rain we got last night! Gian Carlo Menotti (July 7, 1911 – February 1, 2007) was an Italian-American composer and librettist. Although he often referred to himself as an American composer, he kept his Italian citizenship.[1] He wrote the classic Christmas opera Amahl and the Night Visitors among about two dozen other operas intended to appeal to popular taste. He won the Pulitzer Prize for two of them: The Consul (1950) and The Saint of Bleecker Street (1955). He founded the noted Festival dei Due Mondi (Festival of the Two Worlds) in 1958 and its American counterpart, Spoleto Festival USA, in 1977. In 1986 he commenced a Melbourne Spoleto Festival in Australia, but he withdrew after three years. Wikipedia: Gian Carlo Menotti

Today was another Sunday Lunch Ride, hosted by Steve, for our local cycling club! We drove to the beautiful Applegate Valley and parked mere feet from the Applegate Lodge where Steve and I got married! From there we went on a lovely 31.5-mile ride along the stunning Applegate River and stopped halfway through for lunch and wonderful conversation! It was a perfect day and included flowering trees everywhere, wonderful farms, and even a baby Holstein calf who galloped along beside me while I sang a happy "Mooooooooooooooo!!!!!" This Magnolia blossom was just one of the zillion pictures I took at lunchtime, captured with the tree trunk behind it. I have so many images of these flowers that I would like to share but I'm out of time tonight so I'll just have this one for now! :) More to come!! Neltje Blanchan De Graff Doubleday (October 23, 1865 – February 21, 1918) was a United States scientific historian and nature writer who published several books on wildflowers and birds under the pen name Neltje Blanchan. Her work is known for its synthesis of scientific interest with poetic phrasing. Wikipedia: Neltje Blanchan

I had to edit this poem a bit to make it fit! This is how it goes unedited: It is daffodil time, so the robins all cry, For the sun's a big daffodil up in the sky, And when down the midnight the owl call "to-whoo"! Why, then the round moon is a daffodil too; Now sheer to the bough-tops the sap starts to climb, So, merry my masters, it's daffodil time.” ~ Clinton Scollard Our daffodils have totally exploded into bloom and are looking magnificent! We currently have lovely cream-colored flowers with lemon-yellow cups and we also have these traditional beauties all in yellow. I never tire of these incredible flowers and I often wonder when gazing at them what it must be like to find them growing in the wild! How stunning it must be! Clinton Scollard (1860–1932) was a prolific American poet and occasional writer of fiction. He was a Professor of English at Hamilton College, and collaborator and husband of Jessie Belle Rittenhouse. Wikipedia: Clinton Scollard

This morning I decided to walk along our ridge line to see what flowers are popping up. All over our property, there are different flowers that often only grow in one place, and this flower is one of them! It's called a Henderson's Fawn Lily, and though I have found a few growing in our lower forest, almost all of them grow only along the ridgeline and on our hill! In fact, the first time I saw this flower was last year, and we've lived here for six! It makes me wonder just how many flowers come and go without my ever knowing about them! Thomas Nash (baptised 20 June 1593 – died 4 April 1647) was the first husband of William Shakespeare's granddaughter Elizabeth Barnard. He lived most of his life in Stratford-upon-Avon, and was the dominant male figure amongst Shakespeare's senior family line after the death of Dr. John Hall, Shakespeare's son-in-law, in 1635. Wikipedia: Thomas Nash