Tag: cees photography
Amritapuri Flower: December 19, 2019
Amritapuri Flower: December 9
Greenbelt Restoration Site: Mushrooms
Yesterday, as we were walking down the stairs that separate my yard from the restoration site, one of our team leaders pointed out some mushrooms to me. I thought the fact that they were coming up through a coiled hose made them look like a piece of art.
Greenbelt Restoration: Mushrooms
It is my understanding that the presence of mushrooms is an indication that soil is healthy. If that is the case, and I think it is, our restoration site has VERY healthy soil. There are so many mushrooms here now, and they come in many varieties. I will take pictures of more of them, but for now I will share two photos I took several days ago.
Catching Up
I’ve been too busy to write on my blog even though I’ve had numerous ideas. This will be the first of my “catching up” posts!
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My yard used to be covered with grass. I removed the grass from my front yard years ago. Over the last few years I’ve removed it from the back yard as well.
Several years ago, I noticed some white flowers emerging from the ground next to a planter box. I had no idea what it was but knew I had never planted it.
I don’t know when the flowers came up this year; I think it was during August. On September 4th they looked like this:
This time I used a plant identification app to find out what kind of flowers they were. They are called ivy-leaved cyclamen, sowbread, baby cyclamen and cyclamen hederifolium.
I continued to watch and photograph the plant. When I took a photo on October 5 there was much more foliage.
And on October 23 the foliage remained the same, but there were only a couple of flowers.
As I look at this close up now, I’m noticing the spirals. I wonder what they are. Could there be more flowers coming? It doesn’t seem likely but I will find out!
I have enjoyed watching this plant evolve as it goes through its life cycle. Since I don’t know exactly when the flowers were “born”, I will pay even more attention to it next year.
FOTD: September 4, 2019
I realize I have several flowers that I refer to as my favorite flower. When I reflected on that fact today, it occurred to me that my favorite flower changes with the season. In the spring, my favorite flowers are the blooms on my magnolia tree; in summer, I am intrigued by the echinacea flowers; and at this time of the year, my favorite flowers are the ones on my aster shrub. I think I have taken more beautiful shots of those flowers than any other.
This is the photo I just took.
I love it.
Beauty in the Greenbelt: Oceanspray
We’ve planted more than a dozen oceanspray shrubs in our forest restoration site. Some of them may have had a few blossoms last year, but many more have them this year.
This week I saw oceanspray shrubs in other Seattle parks that were 13 feet high and nearly as wide. It will be interesting to see how big the ones in our restored forest grow.
Beauty in the Greenbelt: Bleeding Heart
One of my favorite Greenbelt flowers is the bleeding heart flower; they are so small and delicate. On June 9, I took what I think is an amazing photo of one of those plants.
To me it looks like a bleeding heart flower birthing a seed pod. I look forward to learning how and when to harvest and spread the seeds. Even more, I look forward to seeing a lot more bleeding heart flowers in our Greenbelt restoration site next spring!
Beauty in the Greenbelt: Bald Hip Rose
This spring has been very exciting for me. We planted our first trees, shrubs and ground covers in November of 2017. This year most of those plants had a tremendous growth spurt. Several species bloomed for the first time. One of those was this bald hip rose shrub.
The beginning of the path between the Mt. Baker light rail station and the Hanford Stairs is lined with bald hip rose shrubs.
One day in late May, this is what I saw as I was walking home from the Mt. Baker station.
I realized I was getting a glimpse of what our Greenbelt site is going to look like in a few years. WOW!
Living, Learning and Letting Go 