the nature of the void.

Kev and I went out for a walk this morning. I say "morning", even though it was really early afternoon; such are the wonders of being able to sleep in of a Sunday morn. I foolishly didn't bring either the Mighty Lumix or the Nikon, but being me, I dawdled here and there, snapping crappy close-ups with my phone. And all this rubbed off on the dear boy, because he was looking attentively all around him, and spotted a couple of jack-in-the-pulpits for me.

Not even opened up! Way to go, Kev-o. Later on in our walk, we were headed toward the beaver pond for a status update, and I found my own jack - like the one of the other day, close to the bottom of the driveway.

Each and every one of these is a thrill. 

AND, Solomon's seal abounds as well, along the way to the pond.

She's filling up nicely! 

Hours later, while Kev was off to softball (a double-header, no less) I headed out again, and again, didn't think to bring the 'real' cameras. After all, it was past 6 pm, the light wasn't that great, and "what is there to see?"

Silly me.

I found a mess of teeny Golden Alexanders on the north side of the field on the way out to the road. 

Oh, for the Nikon's zoom lens...

And some type of fern encased in... foam wrapping.

or at least that what it looked like to me.

By now I was pretty close to the pussy willows near the mailbox, I wonder what they're up to...

busy, busy, busy...

Next, I bring you - drum roll please - my oldest white baneberry friend. I've known this guy for like, six or seven years now. Kevin spotted it first, on our walk together earlier, but the best picture of the several I took was from my solo walk:  heaven forfend I arrange pictures out of order. It would violate the... journalistic integrity of this project.

Check out the way the flower buds look like they're being clasped by a hand...I guess that's a leaf, wrapped around them. "Journalistic integrity" indeed... I suspect you need actual readers for your writing to count as anything vaguely journalistic, and I'm pretty sure I'm typing merrily into a void. Who has the time/patience to read this? 

"If a tree falls in the forest, and nobody hears it, does it make a sound?" comes to mind.

Where was I? Oh. Flowers and whatnot. We're just inundated with trillium. Trillia?

This one was up in the mystery woodland. It pleases me to find 'em under the trees, regardless of whether anyone is there to see them. 

The saxifrage, on the other hand, I knew to expect. I promised The Void that I'd get to this with the Nikon: first sunny day! First sunny day!

Blurry because they're friggin' TINY.

I leave off with a magnolia queen upon her throne. 

unfurlings continue

Here's what's been going on around here.

Red eft. Kevin took this picture. 

Ferns just starting to open.

We have a jack! We have a jack! This is basically at the foot of our driveway. It's the only one I've seen. 

Our lilacs are taking their time.

Another type of fern unfurling.

Down past the booming metropolis that is the village of Westminster West, I found a veritable boatload of sarsaparilla. Happiness!

And, back to the ferns.

Blah blah blah, words, pictures, words. I'll leave you with this:

midweek splendor; beech explosion; ferns are weird

Here’s what’s going on in the mystery woodland next to the house. Ferns are coming up!

Let’s take a closer look.

They are apparently made of tiny blobs welded together.

Plus a bunch of fuzz.

Let the records show that we have a flowering trout lily on our own property. It hasn’t turned inside out in ecstasy, the way we saw the other day:

Back to our woods: we have a bunch of these things:

I’m guessing sessile-leaved bellwort. Seeing a flower would be helpful, but so far, none seem to be even on the horizon.

You’re not tired of blue cohosh yet, are you? 

This is pachysandra, which has been sneaking into the vinca’s territory from its homebase around the magnolia tree.

BOATLOADS of miterwort this year.

And this is why I have the macro lens. These flowers are maybe 1/8” across at best.

Starflower! Let’s hope it makes a flower this year. Only found one last year.

Later on, I took a walk on my lunch break at work and headed up into the woods.

Birch catkins. Nutty stuff.

Violet innards.

Beech bud explosion, in slow motion.

First, they just lengthen. You can see how the end of each scale is paler than its base – the darker base color is where it’s newly exposed from the bud lengthening.

At some point the leaves just want out. 

Yippee! Freedom! I did this same series last year. On May 9th. Yep, it’s an early spring.

Two points if you know what this is! I don’t! I thought at first it was a violet, but do they get spurs this long? Do I have photos of the leaves? I do not. Whoops. And no, it’s not a ladyslipper. I think.

There’s nothing ordinary about a dandelion.

 

I spotted this cutie in a stormwater retention pond. Happiness!

youth to old age, in a single day; the virtues of a good book

We have a lot happening simultaneously these days.
1. withering.  As the our northern hemisphere tilts away from the sun, more and more plants are closing up shop for the season. Are the ferns as beautiful as they wither as they were in the spring?

Today.

May 21

You tell me.
2. making babies as fast as they can I went into the Mystery Woodland – scene of many an early-spring flower – this afternoon. I’d neglected to visit it for quite some time: I’ll have to do better next year. Lo and behold, I found some helleborine (Epipactis helloborine) and its fatty seeds. I wanted to linger but the mosquitos (again: WTF?!) were killing me.


Also in this category: wild grape, species unknown, irritatingly out of reach high up in an apple tree.


Next up: plantain. A lawn weed to most, but remember, this is the one with the fantastic purple flowers.

The awesome flowers, a month ago today, as it happens…

…are now getting alarmingly ready to pop.

3. Still flowering – as I’ve mentioned recently… there’s always the asters. This time, the “little purple kind” as opposed to yesterday’s “big purple kind”. I love how some are yellow in the middle, and some are purple. Seems to be a reasonably common feature of asters.

Also, a common-enough little guy I’d kinda been ignoring, but it’s one of the few spots of color left these days:

This is wood sorrel – probably Oxalis europaea. This is the one I always thought of as related to clover (same three-cute-leaves) except for those leaves look like they’re been folded in half. Mother nature sure does love the five-petaled-yellow-flowers.
Remember vinca? It’s a ground cover with shiny dark green leaves. It was flowering back in May. I managed to completely forget to look for what its seeds look like. Well, I may yet get my chance, because I found a few flowers today. Today! Late September!

Oops, that was a little blurry.
And the foliage of primrose looks practically edible, it’s so fresh. It hasn’t gotten the memo yet about winter being on the way.


I have to confess: I spent more time on the couch, doing this:

Happy sigh. This is one author whose stuff we automatically buy, in hardcover, the second it comes out, sight unseen, advance reviews unread. He wrote it, we’ll read it. Pretty simple. Were that all of life were that simple.