I caught this squirrel with a strawberry in his mouth (is it a wild strawberry or one of our garden strawberries – not sure, but it looks like the wild kind). So I grabbed my camera and decided to do Nature Notes. I confess, I haven’t been doing much observing of nature, though I have been gardening. My peas did very well in their cage this spring; I saw a deer walk right past the gardening cage (but the deer did take a chomp out of the tomato plants that were outside the cage).
I did not plant this tall lily in this spot behind my pink rose bush. I used to have similar lilies in a different part of my garden; I probably pulled them all out by mistake when I was weeding. Or they died a natural death. So I was surprised to see a lily blossom elsewhere in my yard.
The raspberries that grow on old can are now ripening in our backyard. The ones on new cane are usually more abundant, and we get to enjoy those in August. Last year wasn’t a great crop; maybe this year will be better? I read somewhere that one should prune the raspberry bushes so they have space in between them. I tried to do some pruning last year. It is hard to photograph a raspberry – the camera doesn’t realize you want to focus on that tiny berry.
In my front yard many pink Mexican poppies are in bloom. My husband remembers the days when he had to mow the front lawn – no more.
There is also purple salvia growing behind the pink Mexican poppies.
The tall green plants behind the Mexican poppies in this shot are lambs’ ear. I originally planted a few that I transported from my mother’s garden in Newton, MA. That was in 1998, so these have been reproducing for over ten years. I’ll probably pull most of them out soon and replace them with summer plants, maybe cucumber plants that I grow among the flowers.
These flowering chives are growing in a pot in my backyard, but since they are in a pot, I could easily transfer them to the front.
My neighbor’s dogwood tree is once again flowering. My dogwood photos from 2008 are one of the most popular posts on this blog.
Dogwood blossoms are a pleasure, but one needs to be fast with the camera or the dogwood blossom season will be done.
One downside of the abundant blossoms in our area is my stuffed nose. Any of you allergy sufferers? A friend of my daughter’s hates spring because of allergies. Sigh.
Cardinal in my backyard: As Carver said the last time I posted this bright red bird, “Male cardinals are the flowers of winter.” This cardinal looks like he owns the place.
I saw two chickadees in my backyard last week. My, do these little birds jump about.
My daughter and I visited Donaldson Park on Sunday. There were many gulls hanging out by the pond; this one was swimming in the middle, apart from his buddies.
Near a slope of Donaldson Park many geese congregated.
This exposed tree trunk is on the edge of a brook on the border of Donaldson Park near the Meadows.
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It’s cold out there! I took a walk through Johnson Park last week; I couldn’t find much other than these ducks. Then I headed over to the Native Plant Reserve to see brown remnants of last spring’s joyous perennials. You can see more if you click on each thumbnail above.
In the above photo are the ducks with the colorful reflections around them (the image in the thumbnail is a cropped version).
In other nature news, my daughter taught me that the New Jersey state bird is a goldfinch and the New Jersey state flower is a violet.
snapdragon leaves in late December 2011 with drops of water
It’s been a while since I’ve done Nature Notes – I could blame both my work load and the gloom of early December darkness, cold and brown. Today it was a tad warmer, and I went outside to photograph some burnt red bald cypress leaves – instead, I found this snapdragon plant with bright green leaves and drops of rain water.
I have an idea for next week’s Nature Notes, but I need your help. Can you tell me which of Michelle’s many topics were your favorite(s) in the past year? Shh… don’t tell Michelle. Oh, is she reading this? Well, anyway, your comments on Best Rambling Woods Nature Topics are requested.
On Sunday we visited Washington Valley Park in Bridgewater, New Jersey. Our friend found the hike on the website njhiking.com; I had never heard of the park before. Pictured is the lovely reservoir at the bottom of the hiking area.
We decided in advance to follow the red trail – it wasn’t always easy to see these markings for the trail on the trees.
I saw a variety of plants growing – no idea what this striped little plant is called.
I recognized these red oval berries from my childhood – I looked up the bush (red berries with thorns is what I looked for in Google Images), and I learned this is called a barberry bush.
I rather liked this plant inside moss that I found on the trail.
There were various streams on our hike that led into the reservoir. The girls (my daughter and friend) had fun hopping over the rocks.
When we got to the top of the hill on the trail, we were rewarded with views of hawks flying overhead.
You could see quite a distance from the top – the fall colors have faded, but they are still varied, though muted.
Last week I saw this brown mourning dove wander about in my yard.
Soon after he noticed that I was following him (her?) around with my camera, he settled on this high phone wire in the back of my yard.
Oh, by the way, did you know that Noah sent out a dove: “And he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the ground.” But before the dove, he sent out a raven. I didn’t have any ravens showing up in my back yard.
My neighbor’s burning bush is quite spectacular – bright red at this time of year. Ah, another Biblical reference, except the burning bush doesn’t show up in the weekly Torah reading until winter time.
Here’s the how the dry oak leaf hydrangea flower looks – this photo was taken the same day as the red hydrangea leaf photos.
