Carrollton Yard – January 2024 (1)

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The temperature was in the 70s…in January! But the plants in my parents’ Carrollton yard were still in winter state. As I walked around the yard, I found myself thinking about whether this would be the last time to photograph the plants. I latched onto the fruitless mulberry trees – thinking at first that I would look closely at the joints of the small stems to the big branches…but then I noticed all the places where larger limbs had been cut over the years with the wound healing in various ways. Somehow, they reminded me of elephant eyes.

There were at least 8 mulberries when my parents bought the house 33 years ago. They were large trees but got larger over the years. One was the “climbing tree” for grandchild in the first decade they lived in the house. Now the trees are nearing the end of their lives; 3 have been cut down before they could fall – their trunks hollowed out with decay; their larger limbs were cut and were burned in the fireplace in recent years. A red oak, sweet gum, and pecan are getting big enough to take over the shading of the garden as the mulberries succumb.

Yaupon hollies were already growing on both corners of the front of the house 33 years ago and have been kept trimmed as ornamentals. There were still plenty of berries…I wondered when the birds would discover them!

A few nandina bushes remain. The berries are pretty…but toxic to birds.

The canna leaves from last summer were golden spotlighted by the sun…I noted the green of some bulbs coming up through the debris already. One of my sisters is determined to clean out the old leaves….have the beds in good shape for the next owner of the house.

More about the Carrollton yard tomorrow…

Carrollton Yard – July 2021

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The back yard in Carrollton, Texas is a sunnier space that when I was here in May (a big tree had to be cut down). And it is summer. There are some cannas that are some of the tallest I’ve seen.

The hydrangeas are waning…the Queen Anne’s Lace is not as abundant as earlier…there are some round yellow-orange blobs of fungus in the shredded wood left from the big tree…they are almost the same color as the cosmos that are blooming in the newly sunny patch…a few Naked Lady Lilies and other shade loving plants are under the pecan tree which is growing rapidly now that the old mulberry is not overhead.

There are metal sculptures that I always notice among the plants – always there but looking different because of the changes of the plants over the season.

In the front yard, the ferns have spores forming on the underside of the fronds and there is only one daisy left.

The red yucca has seed pods developing among its flowers.

In a patch of dirt where some plant has died back, I found an large,empty snail shell…even though haven’t seen a snail in the yard before!

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Overall – the garden in Carrollton has changed quite a lot since May. Having the big tree gone has changed things more than the usual cycle…this next year will be one of transition for the corner of the yard that was very shady and is now full of sun.

Longwood Gardens – September 2019

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Now for the highlights from the rest of the Longwood Gardens. Before the waterlilies we enjoyed the plants around the main entrance to the conservatory.

We always stop at the indoor children’s garden at the very beginning since later it will be a busy place. This time we got there before any families, so it was very quiet. The place it full of accessible water and natural materials made into art.

On the way to the waterlily courtyard, I noticed different colors of cannas and a bird-of-paradise flower.

After the waterlilies we walked through several more ‘rooms’ of the conservatory including one with plantain and banana plants (both with heavy pods of fruit). And the orchid room was there too.

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Then it was outdoors to the trial gardens. They are particularly lush right now after growing all summer. The sunflowers were heavy with the forming seeds.

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We walked to the chimes tower going up the steps of the tower

And then more steps to follow the water to the Eye of Water. Last time we’d come to Longwood, the eye had been closed for renovation, so we wanted to see it this time.

We trekked to the other side of the visitor center for the flower garden walk. There were beginning to be more people around by this time. A hummingbird flew ahead of us but wasn’t stopping for long; too many people about. Just past the Whispering Bench, there were pots with pitcher plants. I remembered them being there last time as well.

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We made our way around the Large Lake to the Italian Water Gardens.  I zoomed in on some of the sculptures. The renovation several years ago is holding up well.

The day was warming up, but we decided to head out to the meadow anyway. The plants are well established now, and we hiked all the way across to the Forest Edge kiosk/bench. I saw taller Joe Pye Weed than I’d ever seen before…lots of goldenrod…a few thistles…skippers and buckeyes…large dragonflies. We were glad to get back to a shady part of the trail. It was a good morning to be at Longwood!

Longwood Gardens – Part I

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Last weekend we made the day trip up to Longwood Gardens. We got there shortly after they opened at 9 and headed for the Conservatory since they only allow tripods before noon and we’re always interested in photography in the gardens.

I had my new camera on a monopod and was experimenting to get the perfect height to use the viewfinder…and not hunch over the camera. There were plenty of flowers to practice with the monopod and the additional zoom capability of the new camera.

The Childrens’ Garden is another reason to get to the Conservatory early….to walk through the confined place before the children arrive. Years ago when my daughter was small there were fountains that she loved to hold her hands under but nothing as fancy as the mosaic bottomed fountain there today.

The area is quite a bit larger than it was 20 years go but full of nooks and cranes for children to enjoy: a metal spider web sculpture near the floor, shells on the low arches of an entrance (adults need to duck!) and several bird/animal sculptures that are water features – at a good height for little hands.

There was a collection of cycads in a tropical forest room with a walkway at canopy level. I was fascinate by one of the ripening cones.

My daughter was intrigued by the leaves of the Swiss Cheese plant.

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We were all remined of Hawaii by the Torch Ginger.

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The ‘new to me’ plant was a Cocoon Plan in the desert. Somehow, I had not noticed it before. It is a succulent.

Outdoors at Brookside Gardens

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I try to take a few minutes before each shift volunteering at Brookside Gardens Wings of Fancy to walk around outside in the gardens. There is a lot going on in August. I am featuring some of my favorite things I noticed and photographed in this post.

Button bush and cone flowers and sunflowers – with and without bees.

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Joe Pye Weed in bloom…very popular with the tiger swallowtails. One morning I photographed a dark morph female with several of the yellow and black versions.

Monarchs are more prevalent in the garden than they were earlier.

I can never resist checking the gingko tree near the conservatory. I like the way the leaves look outlined in gold of the morning sunshine.

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The sumac is a plant I am tracking this year. I recognize the seed heads but want to capture how the seeds develop. This will take me further into the fall since they don’t look like they’ve changed too much during this month.

There are always a lot of funnel spider webs in the low pines around the conservatory….and sometimes the spider is visible.

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There are several kinds of datura in the garden.

I had never nptoced what the seed pod looked like before.

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Some of the trumpets hang downward and I appreciated that the screen on my new camera can pivot so I can see what the camera is seeing when it is point straight up! I’ve always wanted to photography the unfurling flower.

The bald cypress has the scale insects like it did last summer but seems healthy enough to survive. The cones are beginning to form.

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The cannas are beautiful this time of year. Some are producing seed pods.

This is the view from the ticket taker table for Wings of Fancy. I ended up doing the job when no one had signed up for it….a  last minute change of plans.

There are milkweed plants close to the entrance to the caterpillar house and there are often insects on the plants other than caterpillars. When there are no visitors in the area…I roam around and take pictures; more on the caterpillars tomorrow.

Kenilworth Gardens – Other Stuff

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Of course – lotuses, water lilies, buttonbushes and dragonflies were not the only things to see at Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens last weekend. Even in the island of garden in the parking lot there were things to see. The most interesting (to me), were some tiny acorns on a lower branch of an oak

And a blue jay that seemed very acclimated to people.

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I didn’t spend much time on the boardwalk out to the river but was there long enough to capture a sleepy duck.

There were some colorful canna leaves in the morning sun and

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A gall on one of the trees with shelf fungus make it look something like a face (with a few too many eyes and eye brows!).

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The showy flowers of the rose mallow seemed to be everywhere. I love the flowers with their deep red centers but maybe the tightly wrapped petal in bud form are ever more interesting. Enjoy the mallow slide show below!

Owl Butterfly Eggs

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Last weekend, I took a few minutes to photograph the eggs of the owl butterfly in Brookside Gardens’ Wings of Fancy exhibit. I got as close as I could to the canna leaf where they were located and then clipped out the part of the picture to see them even better. The eggs quite small – about the size of the head of a straight pin – and look smooth to the eye. With the magnification of the enlarged picture it is easy to see that they:

  • Are ribbed
  • That they change as they develop with the white one being one that is probably not going develop. The others probably have a tiny caterpillar developing. Do you see the light brown C shape in the third egg from the left? Looks like a developing caterpillar!

One of the joys of volunteering at the Wings of Fancy exhibit is being there frequently enough to see the progression of butterfly development…and occasionally capturing some of it with my camera.