Apr 28

Flowers That Bloom in the Spring, II

Posted: under photography, Plantlife, Wildlife.
Tags: , , , ,  April 28th, 2010

Engelmann’s Daisy, one of the old native prairie plants that cattle love to eat.   We’re trying to get it established again–so far, in a protected location:

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Apr 27

Flowers That Bloom in the Spring, I

Posted: under photography, Plantlife.
Tags: , ,  April 27th, 2010

The end of a drought brings amazing flower displays–both in variety and in number.   Here are a few of our beauties, up close:

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Apr 24

New to the List

Posted: under Wildlife.
Tags: , , ,  April 24th, 2010

Always fun to find a new (to us) species for the list, even when it’s a small assassin bug:

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Apr 11

Rusty Blackhaw Viburnum: #1 shrub

Posted: under photography, Plantlife.
Tags: , ,  April 11th, 2010

Along the fencerows and in the creek bottoms at this time of year, you’ll see sudden puffs of white on shrubs that range from waist high up to about 15 feet.  The first white-flowering shrubs–with discrete “powderpuff” flowers–are Rusty Blackhaw Viburnum, Viburnum rufidulum, a native here which is being destroyed by development.  That’s because developers and land managers think of anything but large oaks as “brush” to be cleared away.

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Mar 18

First Bluebonnet (and more flowers)

Posted: under photography, Plantlife, Wildlife.
Tags: , , ,  March 18th, 2010

It’s not fully open yet, but we count “first bluebonnet” from the first “bonnets” being open, so this counts.  You can see one not as far along in the background.

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Mar 14

Some Spring Birds

Posted: under photography, Wildlife.
Tags: , , ,  March 14th, 2010

Spring is one of our busiest bird seasons, with winter residents often still around, spring migrants moving through, year-rounders breeding, and the first of the summer residents showing up.

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Mar 06

Early March

Posted: under photography, Plantlife, Wildlife.
Tags: , , ,  March 6th, 2010

The thicketing plums in full bloom–this thicket began with a few stems of plum stuck in the ground.

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Feb 26

Enter the Plums…

Posted: under photography, Plantlife.
Tags: , ,  February 26th, 2010

The earliest native plum is a thicketing bush plum that’s spread in what we laughingly call  the orchard.   First bloom opened yesterday;  this morning I found these, with many more to come.

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Feb 25

More Snow Pictures

Posted: under photography, Weather.
Tags: , , ,  February 25th, 2010

We get snow so seldom (and enough to take pictures of, even more seldom) that I feel several posts of snow pictures are justified.

This is on the trail north from Fox Pavilion to the north fenceline.

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Feb 24

Next Day Snow

Posted: under photography, Weather.
Tags: , ,  February 24th, 2010

Early morning, 22F, snow has crunchy crust…the little Eleocharis there in the wet area are ice-coated but they don’t mind.   What a difference a day makes.  I took different trails than yesterday and have over a hundred images–here are some of my favorites.

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