Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Wild Things


Yep - we're more than just a bit late for Wildflower Wednesday.  We do have a few wild things blooming though.  Just check out these colorful blooms above!   Ed and Zelda have been hanging out here a lot lately.  

Last summer we took down a spruce that died suddenly in September, 2011.   We hadn't noticed anything wrong with the tree, and it was a green as ever.  I was out on the patio one windy afternoon, and suddenly out of nowhere it was raining spruce needles.  Everywhere.  It didn't stop until the old spruce was completely bare about an hour later.  Ed seems to be enjoying the stump.  He rested here all afternoon, after swimming in the swale all morning.  Zelda's there too - beautiful in her own right, just a little more shy than Ed.  They make a cute couple, don't you think?  

They're so much fun to watch.  April's record rainfall, and a full swale have brought them back frequently. They seem to have settled in and made themselves at home.



Spring beauties (Claytonia virginica,) have been blooming for a couple of weeks.  I just love these tiny striped blooms.  The clump has gotten larger this year, and there are new clumps forming in other spots in the garden.  Ants may have planted the seeds for us. 

 Sanguinaria canadensis, also known as bloodroot, came from Mom's woods a few years ago.  This clump has grown quite a bit too - from one small leaf and one bloom, to this nice little clump and a succession of blooms, each lasting only a few days before the petals fall.  They're fleeting, but lovely, and the large, leathery leaves are pretty cool too.

  
Celandine poppies (Stylophorum diphyllum) are just getting started.  These are the first blooms.  They'll continue blooming all spring and into the summer.  Celandine poppies are the longest-blooming natives in our garden.  I love the lacy foliage on these plants. 


Tiny bunnies, eyes not even open yet are 'blooming' in our garden this month too.  I have fantasies of rabbit stew, but they're too cute and precious to harm.  I think that now, but those fantasies will be back when they start mowing down the garden.  We don't call this place Bunnies' Salad Bar & Grill for nothin'!

Virginia bluebells (Mertensia virginica) are just getting started too.  They're among my favorite flowers in spring.  

After a long winter and a slow spring, it's warming up here just in time for May.  After a slow start, the garden has come alive in the last couple of weeks, and everything is appreciating the extra rain after last year's drought and heat.  

I  hope you're enjoying beautiful spring blooms, and plenty of rain (but not too much!) in your little corner of the world.

To see more Wildflower Wednesday posts, please visit Gail at Clay and Limestone.  Thank you for hosting, Gail!

16 comments:

  1. Hello! You have interesting wildlife in your garden. I would have thought that colourful duck is another garden ornament if it don't move at all ;-)

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    1. Hi Stephanie! I took the photo on the weekend, and he was sleeping on the stump like that for hours! Even though he was sleeping, he stirred and watched me like a hawk when I was photographing him!

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  2. I chuckled at your remark, "Bunnies' Salad Bar & Grill" It is wickedly humorous, but not for the bunnies! I think the drake is a show-off and its mate is looking on indulgently. Just prove that some male egos need to be inflated once in a while.

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    1. Although the salad bar part of that is reality Stiletto, so far the grill part is just fantasy!

      I think the drake was enjoying having his picture taken!

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  3. Anonymous6:52 PM

    The Claytonia and bloodroot are so beautiful and delicate, wish I had some. The celandine poppy is NOT delicate, but it is a flower I love and I have lots of it.

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    1. I agree! This year I'm going to let the celandine poppies seed themselves around a bit. I have a newer bed I want to add them to. Maybe I can send you seeds for the bloodroot and spring beauties. I haven't collected seeds from them before but I'm sure I could!

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  4. Lovely spring flowers! And very sweet rabbits... hope they will really not end up in a stew *LoL*.
    Have a lovely Weekend.
    Alex

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    1. No rabbit stew here anytime soon Alex, but I can't help fantasizing about turning them into stew when they mow down the garden!

      Hope you're having a great weekend! It's beautiful here - a perfect spring weekend with nice mild temperatures and plenty of sunshine.

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  5. Lovely wild things, indeed, Linda! The baby bunnies are so cute. It reminds me of when I was a girl--my dad would often bring home one or two baby rabbits that he found after working the fields. Once the nest had been disturbed by his farm implements, the mother would not return, so he brought them home for me to take care of. Sadly, I don't think any of them ever survived more than a few days, though.

    We've had a lot of dead spruces around here in the past year, too; I don't remember what the exact cause of their demise was, but I think it had to do with the drought and weather in general.

    Good to see Ed and Zelda again!

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    1. Their eyes are open this weekend, Rose. Last weekend they were still so teeny and helpless I was able to hold them in my hands without stressing them. This weekend they're much more active, but still in their nest. I suspect if I tried to pick one up now it would probably not be happy at all so I'm letting them be. My girls had pet bunnies when they were young. That happened only once! They would try to eat anything - electrical cords, furniture, carpet - you name it, they seemed to think it was food.

      Spruces can sure be problematic, especially as they age. I suspect this was something fungal, or it could have been pesticide runoff from a neighbor's yard. This spruce was in a low spot in the swale. It always handled the flooding fine by all appearances, but I wouldn't be surprised if all the water it sat in over the years in early spring may have weakened it and made it more susceptible. So far the other two, which were close to the stump don't seem to have been affected, and they are in much drier spots.

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  6. Great post. Love the blooms and the animals/birds! The claytonia virginia are precious. So are the baby bunnies.

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    1. Thank you Victoria! I think I love the wildlife in the garden (even the problematic ones like the bunnies,) as much as I love the plants!

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  7. Why oh why do those terrible pests have to be so darned cute? Sweet pic of the babies. Love all your spring flowers. very beautiful

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    1. I hear you Deanne! They aren't so cute now that they're mowing down the garden. :(

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  8. Everything is so pretty at your house. Those little bunnies give my heart a tug.
    Balisha

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    1. Thank you Balisha. I know what you mean about the bunnies. They are much bigger now, and wreaking their usual havoc in the garden. But they sure were sweet when they were like this, and too small to even be afraid of me. I did pick one up and hold it in the palm of my hand a couple of times. So soft, so tiny, so fragile, so sweet. Now . . . rabbit stew! ;~) (just kidding . . .)

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