Archive for year: 2013

I spent some time in the yard today with my Canon Rebel T2i.  I love the convenience of having a camera in my phone, but it just doesn’t have the glass… with a 60mm macro lens, I can get a lot more detail, and catch more interesting things.

 

This is the Passiflora caerulea vine that has gone into the creekside and grows up the dead sumac bush.

Even with a considerable distance, the macro lens gets right in there.

There’s an ant on this anther.

Another flower on the same vine.  The three bees were wrestling all over one another in a pile, and it seemed really odd – they usually do that for pollen, but not so much nectar in the passionflowers.  Then, when I was looking at the images in the camera, I realized that they have RIPPED OFF the pollen anthers, and are working them over in the middle of the flower.  They remind me of Macbeth’s witches around their cauldron.

A bumblebee on Passiflora incarnata.

This one, I could get right above – so I could focus close, and get a lot of detail.  I really do love the camera, and this lens.

It’s the bee’s knees.  Those are pollen grains.

Passiflora incarnata “Bill’s Delight.”

Close up on the center of the flower.

These corona filaments swirl around themselves in very odd patterns.

…and this flower is pollinating itself.   I just hope it doesn’t go blind.  I love how the anther looks like a tongue licking the stigma.

This exceptionally handsome Viceroy butterfly, Limenitis archippus, has set up a territory which includes the fig tree, the Maximilian sunflowers, and part of the creekside brush.  He will aggressively chase any of the Fritilaries or other butterflies that come close, and sometimes he even buzzes the wasps.  He’s a little petty tyrant.

At least he’s pretty.

I now have four different species of Cestrum – this is Cestrum aurantium “Orange Zest.”  It’s hardy in our zone, and shoots out these bundles of cheery orange-yellow flowers all summer long.

I just wish they were as fragrant as their cousins – Cestrum nocturnum is my favorite fragrant flower in the world; I keep a bush in a pot, and bring it in to the bedroom when it’s in flower.  It only flowers at night.  This one has pretty flowers all day long – but no smell at all.

This lovely little thing is Passiflora mooreana.  It’s easy to suspect the photo for making it look kind of faded and blue, but that’s the way it looks in real life – the whole plant has a kind of sage green tint to it.

a solo shot in the light of the westering sun:

They smell sweet, too.  I really love the ones with sweet scents.  It’s surprisingly powerful, for such a small flower – the flower is only about two inches across, if that.  Here it is next to P. caerulea. 

and a closeup of the center:

another one that’s blooming well right now, is Passiflora incarnata “Bill’s Delight,” a pure-white selection of the native species from Companion Plants nursery.  I had one of these a year ago, and then it suddenly died from the roots up – it looked like slugs ate the skin off the stem.  Now, it’s going gangbusters, sprawling out of its pot and putting up new shoots.

We have two big Golden Orb Weavers in the garden this year – I am going to start feeding them grasshoppers.  The mantises aren’t eating them up fast enough. 

\and the “Scentsation” rose that I planted for Chris is doing well – I really want for it to start putting out more flowers at a time, but it is still adapting and getting its feet under it.

 

 

I’m sorry about the previous post being locked – it’s got a lot of information that’s not quite public domain yet.  But the general idea, I can give you….

 

Before Bill Wyatt passed in 2009, he and I had a talk about getting somebody to replicate his silk reel design.

 

These nice folks stepped up.  I met Roy and Henry at SOAR last October, and they agreed to give it a try.  We’re in the process of testing the prototype.

 

Yaay, silk!