Lilac | New Hampshire Garden Solutions

Posts Tagged ‘Lilac’

Early May Flowers

Posted in Nature, Wildflowers, tagged Blueberry Blossom, Canon SX40 HS, Coltsfoot Flower, Creeping Phlox, Goldthread, Keene New Hampshire, Lilac, Native Plants, Nature, Nature Study, New Hampshire, Old Fashioned Bleeding Hearts, Olympus TG-6, Pin Cherry Flowers, Red Trillium, Sedge Flowers, Shadbush, Small White Violet, Spring Beauty Flowers, Spring Flowers, Spring in New Hampshire, Spring Plants, Spring Wildflowers, Strange Dandelion Blossom, Swanzey New Hampshire, Trout Lily Blossoms, Tulip on May 11, 2022| 20 Comments »

Goldthread (Coptis groenlandicum), one of our prettiest spring flowers, has just come into bloom. The hook shaped parts are its tiny styles, curved like long necked birds. The male stamens are too numerous to count and white tipped, so I’d guess the pollen must be white. The white, petal like sepals last only a short time and will fall off, leaving the tiny, golden yellow true petals behind. The ends of these golden petals are spoon shaped and hold nectar. You can see how an insect would have a hard time sipping the flower’s nectar without bumping into the stamens and carrying off a load of pollen. All of this is going on in a flower just about the size of a standard aspirin.

If you’re looking for goldthread you can find it even in winter, because its shiny leaves are evergreen.

The first blueberry blossoms I’ve seen this year were on a lowbush blueberry (Vaccinium angustifolium). Though the berries are usually close to the same size, lowbush blueberries rarely get more than 2 feet tall while 15-foot-tall highbush blueberries have been seen. I usually find them at about six feet or less. Native Americans called blueberries “star berries” and used the plant medicinally, spiritually, and of course as a food. One of their favorites was a pudding made with dried blueberries and cornmeal.

Coltsfoot leaves (Tussilago farfara) have appeared and, though they have the same color and sheen when young as a wild ginger leaf they’re much bigger and are shaped like a colt’s hoof rather than heart shaped like ginger.

With coltsfoot plants once the leaves appear the flowers pass on, but they had a good run this year. They liked the cool weather and bloomed for weeks. The seed heads are much furrier looking than a dandelion.

But at this time of year flowers come as quickly as they go, and it’s time for the shadbushes (Amelanchier canadensis) to bloom. This scene is a classic shadbush scene, because they almost always bloom along the edges of forests under the taller trees. They are a spring ephemeral shrub / small tree so the flowers will disappear as soon as the leaves come out on the taller trees.

Shadbushes originally got their name from the way they bloomed when the shad fish were running upriver to spawn. Another name, Juneberry, refers to when its fruit ripens. The fruit is said to resemble a blueberry in taste, with a hint of almond from the seeds. Many birds, such as cedar waxwings, love the fruit. Native American used the fruit in pemmican, which is made with fat, fruit, and preserved meat. Shadbush wood is brown, hard, close-grained, and heavy. Native trees can also be very straight, often reaching 25 feet, and Native Americans used it for arrow shafts. They also used its roots and bark medicinally.

Shadbush makes an excellent garden shrub or small tree and they are easily found in nurseries. This photo shows a cultivar I found at the local college. Cultivars have a much heavier bloom than natives.

Along with the shadbushes our native cherries start blossoming. New Hampshire has four native cherry trees: black cherry (Prunus serotina), choke cherry (Prunus virginiana), pin cherry (Prunus pensylvanica), and wild American plum (Prunus americana). The blossoms in the above photo are pin cherry blossoms. Choke cherries will bloom any time now. Just after, or sometimes along with the cherries will come apples and crabapples.

Sedges are still flowering. I think this one was Pennsylvania sedge (Carex pensylvanica) but I wouldn’t bet the farm on that. They usually bloom when trout lilies bloom and that’s just what has happened this year.

But while the sedges are having a good year, so far the trout lilies (Erythronium americanum) have made a poor showing. The spot I go to see them has many hundreds of plants in it but there were only three or four blossoms. I’m hoping I was just too early, so I’ll go back. Trout lilies are in the lily family and it’s easy to see why; they look just like a miniature Canada lily. The six stamens in the blossom start out bright yellow but quickly turn reddish brown and start shedding pollen. Nectar is produced at the base of the petals and sepals (tepals) as it is in all members of the lily family, and it attracts several kinds of bees.

You can tell by the dark anthers that this flower has been open longer than the one we saw in the previous photo. It’s hard to get a shot of them when they don’t have swept back petals because it happens almost immediately after they open.

One of my favorite things about a trout lily blossom is the coloring on the back. Another name for the plant is fawn lily, because the mottled leaves reminded someone of a whitetail deer fawn. Native Americans cooked the small bulbs or dried them for winter food.

The trees are quickly leafing out already and that means less sunshine each day for spring ephemeral flowers like spring beauties (Claytonia carolinana). I’m seeing fewer blossoms each time I go to see them and this time I had to search for them, so I think it’s getting time to say goodbye to them for another year. I hope I’m wrong though because I love seeing them.

I’ve noticed some fading petals on some of the red / purple trilliums (Trillium erectum) as well but I hope that doesn’t mean they’re already done for the year. I don’t think they’ve been blooming more than two weeks. This one didn’t look too bad.

I see many hundreds of this very small white violets and I always wonder if they could be northern white violets (Viola pallens) but I always forget to look for a spur on the back of the lower petal. They are half the size of the violets that I usually see.

The insect guides are deep purple and the side petals may or may not have hairs on this generally non-hairy violet. They’re pretty little things and they’re everywhere right now.

Creeping phlox (Phlox subulata) is native to North America but it acts like an invasive somewhat, because it just pops up in lawns everywhere in this area. Here it was growing in the lawn of an abandoned house. It is sometimes called moss phlox or moss pinks and luckily it doesn’t seem to mind being mowed. Many people wait until it’s done blooming to do their first spring mowing.

Another plant called creeping phlox is Phlox stolonifera that has much the same habit, but it is native only as far north as Pennsylvania. One way to tell them apart is by the darker band of color around the center of the flower; if it is there your plant is Phlox subulata and if it isn’t it is Phlox stolonifera.

Bleeding hearts (Dicentra spectabilis) have just come out and they were beautiful. I was just reading that this is a member of the poppy family, which I hadn’t heard before. It is native to Siberia, China, Korea and Japan, and I didn’t know that either. My son just returned from Korea and he says it’s beautiful there. With flowers like these, I’d bet that it is.

I liked the color of this tulip. Tulips seem to be having a good year this year.

Lilacs are taking their time but it shouldn’t be too much longer before we can smell their wonderful fragrance again.

I don’t know what was going on with this dandelion but it takes first prize for the strangest dandelion blossom I’ve ever seen. All the parts are there but they’re all discombobulated. Maybe it is a sport, which is a genetic mutation. Sports are very important to the nursery trade and we unknowingly grow a lot of them in our gardens. This dandelion appears to be trying to become a double flower. I applaud its nonconformity but I’m sure many will see it as an ugly thing. As a gardener I met many people who thought they hated dandelions, but there was a time in years past when grasses were dug up so that dandelions would have more room to grow, so it’s all in how you look at it. Personally I like to see them for what they are, which is just a pretty yellow wildflower. It’s the only flower I’ve found blooming in all twelve months of the year.

Flowers don’t worry about how they’re going to bloom. They just open up and turn toward the light and that makes them beautiful. ~Jim Carrey

Thanks for coming by.

Read Full Post »

Mid May Flowers

Posted in Nature, Wildflowers, tagged Apple Blossoms, Blueberry Blossoms, Canon SX40 HS, Cherry Blossoms, Crabapple, Eastern Redbud, Fothergilla, Hancock New Hampshire, Hobblebush Flowers, Keene, Leafy Spurge, Lilac, Mid Spring Flowers, Native Plants, Nature, New Hampshire, NH, Northern white violet, Olympus Stylus TG-870, Painted Trillium, Poets Daffodil, Slender Speedwell, Spring, Sugar Maple Flower, Swanzey New Hampshire, Tulip, Unknown Flower, Witch Alder, Wood Anemone on May 20, 2020| 29 Comments »

In a normal year painted trilliums (Trillium undulatum) are the third trillium I look for each spring. Usually as the red / purple trilliums fade and nodding trilliums have moved from center stage along comes the painted trillium, which is the most beautiful among them in my opinion. This year though, for some reason painted trilliums have bloomed before the nodders. Unlike its two cousins painted trillium’s flowers don’t point down towards the ground but face straight out, 90 degrees to the stem. With 2 inch wide flowers it’s not a big and showy plant, but it is loved. Painted trilliums grow in the cool moist forests north to Ontario and south to northern Georgia. They also travel west to Michigan and east to Nova Scotia.

Each bright white petal of the painted trillium has a reddish “V” at its base that looks painted on, and that’s where the common name comes from. They like boggy, acidic soil and are much harder to find than other varieties. Many states have laws that make it illegal to pick or disturb trilliums but deer love to eat them and they pay no heed to our laws, so we don’t see entire hillsides covered with them. In fact I consider myself very lucky if I find a group of more than three. I’ve read that trilliums can live for up to 25 years. Native Americans used them to ease the pain of childbirth and for that reason they are also called birthroot.

The small fertile flowers in the center of hobblebush flower heads have opened. The larger, sterile flowers around the outer edge opened about a week ago, and this photo shows the difference in size. Technically a hobblebush flower head is a corymb, which is just a fancy word for a flat topped, usually disc shaped flower head. It comes from the Latin corymbus, which means a cluster of fruit or flowers. All flowers in the cluster have 5 petals, and that’s a good way to identify viburnums versus dogwoods, which have 4 petals. The large sterile flowers do the work of attracting insects and that’s why so many viburnums have this kind of arrangement. It seems to work well, because I see plenty of fruit on them later in the summer. Hobblebush is one of our most beautiful native viburnums.

One thing good about working 25 miles from where I live is how I almost get to see spring happen twice. Shadbushes (Amelanchier canadensis) just finished blooming here but in Hancock they’re just getting started. They are also called Juneberry because in June they’ll be full of small reddish purple berries that birds love. Cedar waxwings will even nest by this shrub each year so they can get first crack at the fruit.

I went to get a goodbye photo of trout lilies and found that they had already gone. In their place were anemones, and that was fine. I should have looked for the trout lilies last week but I completely forgot. The word ephemeral means “lasting for a very short time” so I wasn’t really surprised that I missed them. Leaves are on the trees and it’s warming up.

Wood anemones (Anemone quinquefolia) are sun lovers so there’s a good chance they won’t be blooming much longer with the trees leafing out. They dance in the slightest breeze and Greek legends say that Anemos, the Wind, sends anemones in early spring to warn of his coming. He has certainly moved right in here because it has been windy for almost two months, and last Friday we even had tornado warnings. We didn’t have a tornado but many large trees fell.

The bell like shape of a blueberry blossom must be very successful because many other plants, like andromeda, lily of the valley, dogbane, leatherleaf, and others use it. This photo is of the first highbush blueberry blossoms (Vaccinium corymbosum) I’ve seen this season. It is said that blueberries are one of only three fruits native to North America, but the crabapple is a fruit and it is native to North America as well. The others are cranberries and concord grapes. Native Americans called blueberries “star berries” and used the plant medicinally, spiritually, and of course as a food. One of their favorites was a pudding made with dried blueberries and cornmeal.

New Hampshire has four native cherry trees: black cherry (Prunus serotina), choke cherry (Prunus virginiana), pin cherry (Prunus pensylvanica), and wild American plum (Prunus americana). The blossoms in the above photo are pin cherry blossoms. Choke cherries have just started blossoming as well.

This one I’ve never seen before, so I’m going to need help with it. I found it growing in a local park so it is obviously a cultivated garden plant but I can’t seem to find it, either in books or online.

It’s a very pretty plant that stands maybe a foot tall and the flowers look like they belong in the legume family along with peas, beans, locusts and lupines. If you happen to know its name I’d love to hear from you.

My grandmother loved flowers of all kinds but one of the flowers she loved most were apple blossoms, because of their wonderful fragrance. She lived upstairs and had trouble getting down to see the apple trees that grew near her house so each spring I would cut some of the flowers and bring them to her. Sometimes I would sit on the grass, leaning back against the trunk of one of her old apple trees, daydreaming as I looked up at the blossoms, choosing the best branches; the ones with a few flowers and lots of buds that I’d cut for her. The fragrance of the blossoms on this day brought me back to that boy, who was made of all of the things his senses revealed; the soft grass he sat on, the tree he sat under, the sun shining through its leaves and the bees pollinating its flowers. He was the rain and the wind, he was the universe distilled; he was the blue, the green and the pink. He was the fragrance. He was the bird on the branch and the soft hum of the bees. At ten years old he was all that ever was and all that ever would be, but at the same time he was nothing. He was simply the love that made him want to bring these flowers to his grandmother and he was nothing else, because when you distill the universe down to its very essence love is all that is left.

No matter how wonderful an apple tree can be they are not native to this country. The crabapple is the only apple truly native to North America and there are four species of them. They are Malus fusca, Malus coronaria, Malus angustifolia and Malus ioensis. The crab apple is one of the nine plants invoked in the Anglo-Saxon Nine Herbs Charm, recorded in the 10th century. The nine herbs charm was used for the treatment of poisoning and infection by a preparation of nine herbs. The other eight were mugwort, betony, lamb’s cress, plantain, mayweed, nettle, thyme and fennel.

A single male flower of the sugar maple (Acer saccharum) is a very hard thing to photograph, but I wanted you to see one. They aren’t as showy as other native maples but they must do their job, because we have a lot of sugar maple trees. Sugar maples can reach 100 feet in height and can live to be 400 years old when healthy. I never knew their flowers were so hairy.

I see many hundreds of this very small white violet in lawns and I wondered if they could be northern white violets (Viola pallens.) They are half the size of the violets that I usually see. In fact they are so small that I couldn’t even tell they were violets from five feet away. The insect guides look black in this photo but they’re actually deep purple. They’re pretty little things and they’re everywhere right now.

Our lilacs are finally blooming, and this photo is of the common purple lilac (Syringa vulgaris.) It’s great to smell their wonderful fragrance again. Lilac is the New Hampshire state flower, which is odd because it isn’t a native. Lilacs were first imported from England to the garden of then New Hampshire Governor Benning Wentworth in 1750 and chosen as the state flower in 1919 because they were said to “symbolize that hardy character of the men and women of the Granite State.” Rejected were apple blossoms, purple aster, wood lily, Mayflower, goldenrod, wild pasture rose, evening primrose and buttercup. The pink lady’s slipper is our state native wild flower.

Leafy spurge (Euphorbia esula) is in the euphorbia family, which contains over 2000 species of plants including poinsettia, cassava, and many popular house plants. It’s a plant native to Europe, thought to have been mistakenly imported when its seed was mixed in with other crop seed. It was first seen in Massachusetts in 1827, and from there it spread as far as North Dakota within about 80 years. It can completely overtake large areas of land and choke out native plants, and for that reason it is classified as an invasive species by the United States Department of Agriculture. I find it growing along roadsides and gravelly waste areas but I haven’t seen extremely large colonies of it. All parts of the plant contain a toxic milky white sap which may cause a rash when the sap on the skin is exposed to sunlight. In fact the sap is considered carcinogenic if handled enough. Medicinally the sap is used externally on warts, or internally as a purgative, but large doses can kill. Foraging on the plant has proven deadly to livestock.

Witch alder (Fothergilla major) is a native shrub related to witch hazel. Though native to the southeast it does well here in the northeast, but it is usually seen in gardens rather than in the wild. The fragrant flower heads are bottlebrush shaped and made up of many flowers that have no petals. Their color comes from the stamens, which have tiny yellow anthers at the ends of long white filaments. They are said to make an excellent hedge but I’ve never seen them used that way.

I looked inside a tulip and had a hard time looking away from it. It was a beautiful thing.

The poet’s daffodil (Narcissus poeticus) is such an ancient plant that many believe that it is the flower that the legend of Narcissus is based on. It can be found in botanical texts from as early as 371 BC. It is one of the first cultivated daffodils and is hard to mistake for any other, with its red edged, yellow corona and pure white petals. It has naturalized throughout this area and can be found in unmown fields. It is very fragrant and it is quite remarkable to realize, as you sit admiring its spicy fragrance, that the Roman poet Virgil once did the same thing. I love a plant that comes with a good history lesson.

Eastern Redbud (Cercis Canadensis) is not native to New Hampshire and I have only seen two or three of the trees growing in this area until recently, when I found three large trees growing at the local college. The hardiness of this tree can be questionable here unless trees started from northern grown seed are planted. These were sheltered by buildings, which probably accounts for their large size.

I was surprised to see clusters of redbud flowers surrounding pruned off limbs. They seemed to be coming right out of the bark of the tree. I’m also always surprised by how small the pea like purple flowers are on a redbud but the tree makes up for it by producing plenty of them.

There are more than 500 plants in the veronica family and they can be tough to tell apart, but I’ve always thought that this one might be slender speedwell (Veronica filiformis.) It’s a tiny blossom that I found growing in a lawn, and you could hide a whole bouquet of them behind a pea. This particular speedwell is native to Europe and is considered a lawn weed but there are many others that are native to the U.S., and Native Americans used some of them to treat asthma and allergies.

Silently a flower blooms,
In silence it falls away;
Yet here now, at this moment, at this place,
The world of the flower, the whole of the world is blooming.
This is the talk of the flower, the truth of the blossom:
The glory of eternal life is fully shining here.
~ Zenkei Shibayama

Thanks for coming by. I hope there are many flowers in your lives.

Read Full Post »

Mid May Flowers

Posted in Nature, Wildflowers, tagged Apple Blossoms, Canon EOS Rebel T6, Creeping Phlox, Dwarf Ginseng, Early Spring Plants, Grape Hyacinth, Johnny Jump Ups, Keene, Lilac, Magnolia, Native Plants, Nature, New Hampshire, NH, Olympus Stylus TG-870, Pin Cherry, Pulmonaria, Sessile Leaved Bellwort, Spring, Swanzey New Hampshire, Vinca Minor, Wild Columbine on May 18, 2019| 32 Comments »

I thought I’d illustrate our weather by showing these grape hyacinths, which should be done blooming by now. I saw the first ones blooming just a little over a month ago. Other bulbs like tulips and daffodils are also still blooming so they must be enjoying the cool, damp weather.

Trees with white flowers are everywhere and this one happens to be an apple tree. I think many people are surprised to learn that apple trees are not native to the United States. They have all come from old world stock brought over in the 1600s. Apples from Europe were grown in the Jamestown colony and the first non-native apple orchard was planted in Boston in 1625. Only the crab apple is native to this country and they were once called “common” apples. The Native American Abenaki tribe called them “apleziz” and used them for food as well as medicinally.

But it doesn’t matter where apples come from, because the fragrance is wonderful. Apple blossoms were one of my grandmother’s favorites and I remember bringing her arm loads of flowering branches when I was a boy. They were all you could smell in her house for days after.

Few of us think of creeping phlox (Phlox subulata) as a wildflower but it is actually native to the forests of North America. It is sometimes called moss phlox or moss pinks and April’s “pink moon” got that name from the way the “moss pinks” bloom in that month. It’s a plant that loves growing in lawns and luckily it doesn’t seem to mind being mowed. Even so many people wait until it’s done blooming to do their first spring mowing.

Individual creeping phlox flowers are quite pretty but I doubt many people bother to look at them. They see the mass display but not the individuals responsible for it.

Pin cherry flowers (Prunus pensylvanica) are quite pretty and are pollinated by several kinds of insects. They become small, quarter inch bright red berries (drupes) with a single seed which are also called bird cherries. The berries are said to be very sour but edible and are used in jams and jellies, presumably with a lot of sugar. Native Americans used the berries in breads and cakes and also preserved them and ate them fresh. The bark of the tree was used medicinally for a large variety of illnesses including coughs, stomach pains and as a burn salve.

I can remember picking lilacs for my grandmother on Mother’s day but not this year. I’d guess that they’re close to two weeks late. So far this small flower head is the only one I’ve seen but that’s probably because of the cool wet weather. We had a dusting of snow yesterday morning so if it’s cold enough to snow it’s cold enough to keep those buds closed. This one was small in size but not in fragrance. It’s great to smell lilacs again.

Johnny jump ups (Viola tricolor) have jumped up almost over night. This beautiful dark one was the first I’ve seen. This wild form of the modern pansy has been known and loved for a very long time. It is said to have 60 names in English and 200 more in other languages. In medieval times it was called heart’s ease and was used in love potions. Stranger names include “three faces in a hood.” Whatever it’s called I like seeing it appear at the edge of my lawn in spring. I always try to encourage it by letting it go to seed but it never seems to spread.

Just after many other magnolias lose their flowers this one with tulip shaped flowers starts blooming. Its name is “Jane” and though I’m not crazy about the flower shape I love its color. It’s later bloom time means less chance of damage by frost.

Vinca (Vinca minor) has come into full bloom now. The word vinca means “to bind” in Latin, and that’s what the plant’s wiry stems do. They grow quickly into an impenetrable wiry mat that other plants can’t grow through and I’ve seen large areas of nothing but vinca in the woods, still blooming beautifully 200 years after it was first planted. You can often find huge colonies of it near old cellar holes. Still, it is nowhere near as aggressive as many other invasive plants and people enjoy seeing its beautiful violet flowers in spring. Another name for it is Myrtle.

Sessile leaved bellwort (Uvularia sessilifolia) is also called wild oats and the plants have just come into bloom. They are a spring ephemeral and won’t last but they do put on a show when they carpet a forest floor. They are a buttery yellow color which in my experience is always difficult to capture with a camera. The spring shoots remind me of Solomon’s seal but the plant is actually in the lily of the valley family.

The word “sessile” in the name describes how the leaves of a sessile leaved bellwort lie flat against the stem, with no leaf stalk. The leaves are also elliptic and are wider in the middle than they are on either end.

A forest floor carpeted with sessile leaved bellworts makes an unforgettable sight. Many tens of thousands of them grow along the Ashuelot River in Keene.

Dwarf ginseng (Panax trifolius) plants have three leaflets on each compound leaf and together form a whorl of three compound leaves around the stem. The plants are very small; each one would fit in a teacup with plenty of room to spare. Dwarf ginseng is very choosy about where it grows and will only grow in undisturbed ground in old hardwood forests. It is not the ginseng used in herbal medicine but it is quite rare in my experience, so it should never be picked.

Each dwarf ginseng flower head is about the size of a malted milk ball, or about 3/4 of an inch in diameter. Individual flowers are about 1/8 inch across and have 5 bright white petals, a short white calyx, and 5 white stamens. In a good year the flowers might last 3 weeks, and if pollinated will be followed by tiny yellow fruits.

Pulmonaria usually has green leaves splotched with silver but this one I saw in a local park must be a new hybrid. Pulmonaria (Pulmonaria officinalis) is an old fashioned but pretty evergreen garden plant that originally hails from Europe and Asia. The silver mottled leaves were once thought to resemble a diseased lung and so its common name became lungwort. People thought it would cure respiratory ailments like bronchitis and the leaves were and still are used medicinally in tinctures and infusions.

The leaves and flowers are edible, and if you’ve ever had vermouth you’ve had a splash of pulmonaria because it is one of the ingredients. The plant does well in shade and has flowers of blue, pink, white, purple and red.

I finally saw the wild columbines (Aquilegia canadensis) blooming and thankfully Ii was a nice uneventful hike out to see them. I’ve found that my bear encounter of a couple of weeks ago has taken a lot of the shine off this hike. It’s hard to relax when you know you need to be on your guard.

But as always the columbines were beautiful and I lost myself in them for a while. I took shot after shot, trying to get the best view I could. Much like people flowers have a best side, and your job as a nature photographer is to find it. If you want to really see nature like you’ve never seen it before, look at it through a camera lens.

The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera. ~Dorothea Lange

Thanks for stopping in.

Read Full Post »

Buds

Posted in How To, Nature, tagged Beech, Box Elder, Canon SX40 HS, Cornelian Cherry, Gray Birch, Hawthorn, Highbush Blueberry Buds, Hobblebush, Keene, Lilac, Magnolia, Mountain Ash, Native Plants, Nature, New Hampshire, NH, Olympus Stylus TG-870, Red Maple, Rhododendron, Staghorn Sumac, Sugar Maple, Swanzey New Hampshire, Sycamore, Tree Identification, Winter Buds, Winter Hiking, Winter Plants, Winter Woods on January 20, 2018| 22 Comments »

I don’t know why I get an itch to start looking at buds at this time of year but I always have. Maybe it makes me think of spring. Buds do give clues that the ground has thawed by taking up water and swelling, and if you watch a bud every other day or so in spring you can see it happen. I usually watch lilac buds, but nothing says spring like the sugar maple buds (Acer saccharum) in the above photo. Sugar maples have large, pointed, very scaly terminal buds flanked by smaller lateral buds on either side. The lateral buds are usually smaller than the terminal bud. Sugar maple twigs and buds are brown rather than red like silver or red maples and the buds have several scales. Buds with many scales that overlap like shingles are called imbricate buds. A gummy resin fills the spaces between the scales and makes the bud waterproof. This is especially important in cold climates because water freezing inside the bud scales would destroy the bud.

For those who can’t see or don’t want to look at small buds like those on sugar maples fortunately there are big buds on plants like rhododendron. It also has imbricate buds that are large enough to see without magnification. Bud scales are modified leaves that cover and protect the bud through winter. Some buds can have several, some have two, some have just one scale called a cap, and some buds are naked, with none at all.

You can see the gummy resin that glues some bud scales together on this gray birch (Betula populifolia) bud. Ruffed grouse will eat both the buds and catkins and pine siskins and black-capped chickadees eat the seeds of gray birch. Yellow-bellied sapsuckers feed on the sap and I’ve seen beavers take an entire clump of gray birch overnight, so they must be really tasty. Deer also browse on the twigs in winter.

Some of the smallest buds I know belong to hawthorns (Crataegus) and the cherry red hawthorn bud in the above photo could easily hide behind a pea. There are over 220 species of hawthorn in North America, with at least one native to every state and Canadian province. In New Hampshire we have 17 species, so the chances of my identifying this example are slim to none. The closest I can come is Gray’s hawthorn (Crataegus flabellata.) I know the tree in the photo well so I know that its blossoms will be white. Hawthorn berries are called haws and are said to have medicinal value. Native Americans mixed the dried haws and other fruits with dried venison and fat to make pemmican. The dried flowers, leaves, and haws can be used to make a tea to soothe sore throats, and hawthorn also shows promise for treating heart disease.

If you can’t identify a hawthorn by its buds then its thorns will help. On this example they were about 2 inches long and just as sharp as they look. Native Americans made fences around their settlements with brambles and thorny branches like those from hawthorns. They also made very sharp awls and fish hooks from hawthorn thorns.

The lilac buds (Syringa vulgaris) in the above photo are another good example of imbricate buds. Lilac buds are very red and in spring once the plant begins taking up water again they can swell quickly enough to notice, if they’re regularly watched. I’ve watched lilac buds in spring since I was just a small boy and it has always been one of my favorite things to do in the spring. They aren’t swelling yet but it won’t be long before spring is here.

Highbush blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum) buds are also imbricate buds, and also very red. It’s interesting that almost everything about the blueberry is red except for its berry. The new twigs are red, the bud scales are red, and the fall foliage is very red.

A bud I most look forward to seeing open is the beech (Fagus grandifolia.) There are beautiful silvery downy edges on the new laves that only last for a day or two, so I watch beech trees closely starting in May. Botanically beech buds are described as “narrow conical, highly imbricate, and sharply pointed.” In May they are one of the most beautiful things in the forest.

Buds with just two (sometimes three) scales are called valvate. The scales meet but do not overlap. This Cornelian cherry bud is a great example of a valvate bud. In the spring when the plant begins to take up water through its roots the buds swell and the scales part to let the bud grow. Some bud scales are hairy and some are covered with sticky resin that further protects the bud. Cornelian cherry (Cornus mas) is an ornamental flowering shrub related to dogwoods. It blooms in early spring (in March) with clusters of blossoms that have small, bright yellow bracts. It has a long history with mankind; its sour red fruit has been eaten for over 7000 years, and the Persians and ancient Romans knew it well.

Magnolia flower buds in botanical terms are “densely pubescent, single-scaled, terminal flower buds.” The hairy single scale is called a cap and it will fall off only when the bud inside has swollen to the point of blossoming.

Sycamore bud scales (Platanus occidentalis) are also made of a single brown cap which will fall off to reveal the bud only when the weather warms. When buds are covered by a single bud scale they are encircled completely by a bud scale scar when the scale falls off.

The mountain ash bud (Sorbus americana) in this photo looks like it has a single cap like bud scale but it actually has several overlapping scales which are quite sticky. It looks like a squirrel might have been nibbling at this one.

Red maple flower buds (Acer rubrum) are small and round or oval with short stalks and 4 pairs of bud scales. The bud scales are often purple and / or tomato red. They have a fine fringe of pale hairs on their margins. Red maples can be tapped and syrup made from their sap but the sap gatherers have to watch the trees carefully, because the sap can become bitter when the tree flowers. Seeing the hillsides awash in a red haze from hundreds of thousands of red maple flowers is a treat that I always look forward to. Unfortunately I’ve found that it’s almost impossible to capture that beauty with a camera.

Box elder buds (Acer negundo) and young twigs are often a beautiful blue or purple color due to their being pruinose. Pruinose means a surface is covered in white, powdery, waxy granules that reflect light in ways that often make the surface they are on appear blue. Certain grapes, plums, and blueberries are pruinose fruits. Certain lichens like the beautiful smoky eye boulder lichen have fruiting bodies (Apothecia) that are often pruinose.

Staghorn sumacs (Rhus typhina) have no bud scales at all, so their naked buds are hairy and the hairs protect the bud. Another name for staghorn sumac is velvet tree, and that’s exactly what its branches feel like. Native Americans made a drink from this tree’s berries that tasted just like lemonade, and grinding the berries produces a purple colored, lemon flavored spice.

Hobblebush (Viburnum lantanoides) is another native shrub with naked buds. This photo shows that the flower bud in the center and the surrounding leaf buds are clothed more in wool than hair, but there are no scales for protection. Still, they come through the coldest winters and still bloom beautifully each spring.

Sometimes there is no flower bud at the end of a hobblebush branch so the leaf buds are able to clasp tightly together, and they always remind me of praying hands. I’m not sure what caused the dark spots on these examples. It’s something I’ve never seen before.

The chubby little green and purple buds of red elderberry (Sambucus racemosa) are some of my favorites, but I don’t see them often. I find that being able to identify trees and shrubs when they don’t have leaves adds another layer to the enjoyment of nature study, and I hope readers will try to learn a few. If you are interested in studying tree and shrub buds, start with one in your own yard that you are sure of like a maple tree, and then branch out to those you don’t know well. The following information might be helpful:

A bud scale is made up of modified leaves or stipules that cover and protect the bud in winter. Usually the number of bud scales surrounding a bud will help identify a tree or shrub.

Imbricate bud: A bud with numerous scales that overlap each other like shingles.
Valvate bud: A bud with two or three scales that do not overlap.
Caplike bud: A bud with a single scale that comes off in the spring.
Naked bud: A bud with no scales.

Winter is on my head, but eternal spring is in my heart. ~Victor Hugo

Thanks for stopping in.

Read Full Post »

Buds

Posted in Nature, Things I've Seen, tagged American Beech, Black Birch, Canon SX40 HS, Catalpa, Cornelian Cherry, Gray Birch, Hobblebush, Keene, Lilac, Magnolia, Nannyberry, Native Plants, Nature, New Hampshire, NH, Olympus Stylus TG-870, Red Oak, Rhododendron, Staghorn Sumac, Striped maple, Sugar Maple, White Pine, Winter Buds, Winter Hiking, Winter Plants, Winter Woods on January 11, 2017| 31 Comments »

I’ve spent many winters watching the buds of trees and bushes, especially those right around my house like the lilac (Syringa vulgaris) in the above photo. I check it regularly starting in February for signs of swelling. In winter buds are my connection to spring and I love watching the bud scales finally open to reveal tiny leaves or flowers. Bud scales are modified leaves that cover and protect the bud through winter. Some buds can have several, some have two, some have just one scale called a cap, and some buds are naked, with none at all. Buds that have several scales are called imbricate with scales that overlap like shingles. A gummy resin fills the spaces between the scales and makes the bud waterproof. This is especially important in cold climates because water freezing inside the bud scales would destroy the bud. The lilac bud above is a good example of an imbricate bud.

For those who can’t see or don’t want to look at small buds like lilacs fortunately there are big buds on plants like rhododendron. It also has imbricate buds. This one was half the length of my thumb.

Buds with just two (sometimes three) scales are called valvate. The scales meet but do not overlap. This Cornelian cherry bud is a great example of a valvate bud. In the spring when the plant begins to take up water through its roots the buds swell and the scales part to let the bud grow. Some bud scales are hairy and some are covered with sticky resin that further protects the bud. I was surprised to see the bud scales on this example opening already. We can still get below zero cold.

Cornelian cherry (Cornus mas) is an ornamental flowering shrub related to dogwoods. It blooms in early spring (in March) with clusters of blossoms that have small, bright yellow bracts.

Native nannyberry buds (Viburnum lentago) are also examples of valvate buds. These buds always remind me of great blue herons or cranes. The bottom bud scale was broken on this one. Nannyberry is another of our native viburnums but unlike many of them this shrub produces edible fruit. Native Americans ate them fresh or dried and used the bark and leaves medicinally.

Staghorn sumacs (Rhus typhina) have no bud scales so their naked buds are hairy and the hairs protect the bud. Another name for staghorn sumac is velvet tree, and that’s exactly what its branches feel like. Native Americans made a drink from this tree’s berries that tasted just like lemonade, and grinding the berries produces a purple colored, lemon flavored spice.

Hobblebush (Viburnum lantanoides) is another native shrub with naked buds. This photo shows that the flower bud in the center and the two leaf buds on either side are clothed more in wool than hair, but there are no scales for protection. Still, they come through the coldest winters and still bloom beautifully each spring.

Magnolia flower buds in botanical terms are “densely pubescent, single-scaled, terminal flower buds,” which means that instead of using scales or hairs they use both. The hairy single scale is called a cap and it will fall off only when the bud inside has swollen to the point of blossoming. Meanwhile, the bud stays wrapped protectively in a fur coat.

Red oak (Quercus rubra) buds usually appear in a cluster and are conical and reddish brown. I like the chevron like pattern that the bud scales make. Red oak is one of our most common trees in New England but in the past many thousands were lost to gypsy moth infestations. It is an important source of lumber, flooring and fire wood. The USDA says that red oaks can live to be 500 years old.

Terminal buds appear on the end or terminus of a branch and nothing illustrates that better than the sugar maple (Acer saccharum.) The large, pointed, very scaly bud is flanked by smaller lateral buds on either side. The lateral buds are usually smaller than the terminal bud. Sugar maple twigs and buds are brown rather than red like silver or red maples. In 2016 New Hampshire produced 169,000 gallons of maple syrup but the season only lasted through the month of March due to the warm weather. The average cost per gallon in 2015 was $59.40. I’m guessing it went up in 2016.

Striped maples (Acer pensylvanicum) have colorful twigs and buds and are among the easiest trees to identify no matter what time of year because of the green and white vertical stripes on their bark. Their terminal buds have two scales and are valvate like the nannyberry buds. Striped maple is very fussy about where it grows and will not stand pollution, heat, or drought. It likes cool, shady places with sandy soil that stays moist. They bloom in June and have very pretty green bell shaped blossoms.

Striped maple bark makes the trees very easy to identify when they’re young, but as trees age the bark becomes uniformly gray.

The bud I’m probably most looking forward to seeing open in spring is the beech (Fagus grandifolia.) There are beautiful silvery downy edges on the new laves that only last for a day or two, so I watch beech trees closely starting in May. Botanically beech buds are described as “narrow conical, highly imbricate, and sharply pointed.”

It was about 15 degrees and snowing when this photo was taken and you can see the frozen gummy resin that glues some bud scales together on this gray birch (Betula populifolia) bud and male catkin on the right. Ruffed grouse will eat the buds and catkins and. pine siskins and black-capped chickadees eat the seeds. Yellow-bellied sapsuckers feed on the sap and I’ve seen beavers take an entire clump of gray birch overnight, so they must be really tasty. Deer also browse on the twigs in winter.

Black birch buds (Betula lenta) don’t have as many bud scales as gray birch buds and the bark doesn’t look at all like other birches, so it can be hard to identify. Another name for the tree is cherry birch and that’s because its bark looks like cherry bark. It is also called sweet birch because it smells like wintergreen, and I always identify it by chewing a twig. If it tastes like wintergreen then I know it’s a black birch. Trees were once harvested, shredded and distilled to make oil of wintergreen. So many were taken that they became hard to find, but they seem to be making a good comeback.

Everything about the northern catalpa (Catalpa speciosa) tree is big. It grows to 70-100 feet and has huge heart shaped leaves. Great trusses of large white orchid like flowers blossom appear on them in late spring, and even the seedpods look like giant string beans. But then there are its buds, which are tiny. In this photo the brown leaf bud appears just above the suction cup like leaf scar, which is where last year’s leaf was. Each tiny bud has about six small pointed scales. Catalpa wood is very rot resistant and railroads once grew large plantations of them to use as rail ties. It has also been used for telephone poles. The word catalpa comes from the Native American Cherokee tribe.

Catalpa trees have the biggest leaves of any tree I know of. This shot of my camera sitting on one is from a couple of years ago. It’s amazing that such a big thing can grow from such a tiny bud.

Clusters of small, sticky buds appear at the ends of white pine branches (Pinus strobus.) They are sticky because they’re coated with pine sap, which we call pine pitch. They aren’t sticky when it’s cold though; the white platy material is frozen pine pitch. Once the weather warms it will go back to being a thick, amber, sticky fluid that doesn’t easily wash off.

I have to apologize for the quality of some of these photos. With it dark before and after work these days photography can only happen on weekends and if it’s dark and cloudy on those days then I have to assume that nature is giving me a lesson in great patience and I just have to do what I can with the camera.

Despite the poor photos I hope this post has shown how interesting and beautiful buds can be, and I hope you’ll have a look at the buds in your own yard or neighborhood. You might be very surprised by what you find.

Leaves wither because winter begins; but they also wither because spring is already beginning, because new buds are being made. ~Karel Capek

Thanks for coming by.

Read Full Post »

Survivors

Posted in Nature, Wildflowers, tagged Daffodils, Dandelion, Frost Damage, Grape Hyacinth, Ground Ivy, Hellebore, Henbit, Hobblebush, Hyacinth, Lilac, Magnolia, Mayflower, Red Maple, Striped Squill, Sxilla, Trailing Arbutus, Tulip on April 16, 2016| 33 Comments »

Our last bout of cold snowy weather finished off quite a few flowers that were blooming early because of being fooled by extreme warmth beforehand. The daffodils in the above photo for instance, bloomed a good month earlier than last year. Unfortunately the record cold won out and their stems turned to mush. The leaves didn’t though, and that’s all important. It’s the foliage photosynthesizing that will ensure a good crop of blossoms next year.

Many were damaged but there were more coming into bloom. Luckily most plants flower and leaf out at staggered times so it would be rare for all of a species to lose its flowers at once.

Hyacinths were as beautiful this year as I’ve ever seen them but the cold also hurt their fragile stems and many were lying down and giving up the ghost by the time I got to see them.

Some were still standing though, and the fragrance was still heavenly.

The pink magnolia didn’t fare well. Every bud that was showing color had been damaged and had some brown on it.

The hardest things to see were the many thousands of red maple (Acer rubrum) blossoms that died from the cold but again, I’m sure many of them bloomed after the cold snap. Many birds and animals eat the seeds and I hope there won’t be a shortage this year. These flowers should be tomato red.

These pink tulips were very short and small and also very early, but still late enough to miss the extreme cold. I saw some orange examples which weren’t so lucky.

Dandelions (Taraxacum officinale) don’t seem to have been bothered by the cold and they’re everywhere this year. I think I’ve already seen more than I have in the past two years. I wish I knew what it was that made them so scarce for that time. I love dandelions and formed an early relationship with them. My grandmother used to have me pick the new spring leaves so she could use them much like she did spinach when I was a boy.

In a ground ivy blossom (Glechoma hederacea) five petals are fused together to form a tube. The lowest and largest petal, which is actually two petals fused together, serves as a landing area for insects, complete with tiny hairs for them to hang onto. The darker spots are nectar guides for them to follow into the tube. The unseen pistil’s forked style is in a perfect position to brush the back of a hungry bee. This flower is all about continuation of the species, and judging by the many thousands that I see its method is perfection. It’s another invader, introduced into North America as an ornamental or medicinal plant as early as the 1800s. Many people don’t like ground ivy’s scent but I raked over a colony yesterday and I welcomed it.

Henbit (Lamium amplexicaule) gets its common name from the way chickens peck at it. The plant is in the mint family and apparently chickens like it. The amplexicaule part of the scientific name means clasping and describes the way the hairy leaves clasp the stem. The plant is a very early bloomer and blooms throughout winter in warmer areas. Henbit is from Europe and Asia, but I can’t say that it’s invasive because I think this is the first time I’ve ever seen it. I’ve read that the leaves, stem, and flowers are edible and have a slightly sweet and peppery flavor. It can be eaten raw or cooked.

I like the cartoon=like face on henbit’s flowers. It’s always about reproduction and I’m guessing the spots are nectar guides for honeybees, which love its nectar and pollen.

The green hellebores in a friend’s garden have bloomed later than the deep purple ones of two weeks ago. I think the purples are my favorites.

In this shot we’re in a flower forest and grape hyacinths (Muscari armeniacum) are the trees. The tiny blossoms really resemble blueberry blossoms and they aren’t in the hyacinth family. They hail from Europe and Asia and the name Muscari comes from the Greek word for musk, and refers to the scent.

Scilla (Scilla sibirica) shrugged off the cold and weren’t bothered by it at all. With a name like Siberian squill I shouldn’t have been surprised, but these small bulbs come from Western Russia and Eurasia and have nothing to do with Siberia. Immigrants brought the plant with them sometime around 1796 to use as an ornamental and of course they escaped the garden and started to be seen in the wild. In some places like Minnesota they are very invasive and people have been asked to stop planting them. Here in New Hampshire I’ve seen large colonies grow into lawns but I assume that was what those who planted them wanted them to do, because I’ve never heard anyone complain about them. Still, anyone who plants them should be aware that once they are planted they are almost impossible to eradicate, and they can be invasive.

Striped squill (Puschkinia scilloides, var. libanotica) also came through the cold unscathed and I was very happy about that because they’re a personal favorite of mine. They’re tiny, much like Scilla, but well worth getting down on hands and knees to see. They’re another small thing that can suddenly become big enough to lose yourself in. Time stops and there you are.

I’ve heard that trailing arbutus (Epigaea repens) is already blooming in Maine and New York but all I’ve seen here are buds so far. I’m hoping I’ll see some today and be able to show them in the next flower post. They were one of my grandmother’s favorites so I always look forward to seeing (and smelling) the pink and / or white blossoms. It is believed that trailing arbutus is an ancient plant that has existed since the last glacier period. It has become endangered in several states and is protected by law, so please don’t dig them up if you see them. It grows in a close relationship with a fungus present in the soil and is nearly impossible to successfully transplant.

Hobblebush (Viburnum lantanoides) might be blooming this weekend too. As the above photo shows the buds are swelling up and beginning to open. When all of its hand size white flower heads are in bloom it’s one of our most beautiful native viburnums. Its common name comes from the way the low growing branches can trip up or “hobble” a horse.

Lilac bud scales have pulled back to reveal the promise of spring. Many people here in New Hampshire think that lilacs are native to the state but they aren’t. They (Syringa vulgaris) were first imported from England to the garden of then Governor Benning Wentworth in 1750 and chosen as the state flower in 1919 because they were said to “symbolize that hardy character of the men and women of the Granite State.” Rejected were apple blossoms, purple aster, wood lily, Mayflower, goldenrod, wild rose, evening primrose and buttercup. The pink lady’s slipper is our state native wild flower.

And each flower and herb on Earth’s dark breast
rose from the dreams of its wintry rest.
~Percy Bysshe Shelley

Thanks for stopping in.

Read Full Post »

More Mid May Flowers

Posted in Nature, Wildflowers, tagged Canon SX40 HS, Early Spring Plants, Fringed Polygala, Gaywings, Goldthread, Jack in the pulpit, Johnny Jump Ups, Keene, Lilac, Lily of the Valley, Native Plants, Nature, New Hampshire, NH, Painted Trillium, Panasonic Lumix DMC-527, Pink Lady's Slipper, Purple Trillium, Robin's Plantain, Roseshell Azalea, Skunk Currant, Spring, Spring Ephemerals, Viola on May 23, 2015| 39 Comments »

Cheery little Johnny jump ups (Viola cornuta) have done just that; it seems like one day they weren’t there and the next day they were. The unusual spring heat is causing some plants to bloom two weeks or more ahead of when they normally do and it has been hard to keep up with them.

I was surprised to see a painted trillium (Trillium undulatum) already past its prime. You can see how the bright white has gone out of the petals and how they have become translucent. These are sure signs of age even though it should be just starting to bloom. Each white petal has a pink V at its base and that’s how it comes by its common name. Painted trilliums grow north to Ontario and south to northern Georgia. They also travel west to Michigan and east to Nova Scotia. I hope I find a better example before they go by.

The only time pink lady’s slippers (Cypripedium acaule) have appeared in May on this blog was in 2013 because they usually bloom in June. It’s a beautiful thing and I was happy to see it but all the flowers that are blooming early will also be passing early, and I wonder what there will be to see in June. Nature will take care of things and I won’t be disappointed, of that I have no doubt. Native Americans used lady’s slipper root as a sedative for insomnia and nervous tension. I never pictured natives as being particularly nervous or tense, but I suppose they had their fair share of things to worry about.

If you were hiking with me and saw an eight foot high native roseshell azalea (Rhododendron prinophyllum) in full bloom and didn’t stop and gasp in astonishment I think I’d have to check your pulse just to make sure that you were still with us, because this is something that you don’t see just any old day. It had a rough time over the winter and isn’t blossoming as much as it did last year but it’s still a sight to behold.

There are few things more beautiful than these flowers on this side of heaven. They are also very fragrant with a sweet, clove like aroma. This old azalea grows behind an even older hemlock tree in a very swampy area, surrounded by goldthread plants and cinnamon ferns.

Here is one of the little goldthread plants (Coptis groenlandicum) that grow near the azalea. Goldthread gets its common name from its thread like, bright yellow roots. This plant usually grows in undisturbed soil that is on the moist side. Native Americans used goldthread medicinally and told the early settlers of its value in treating canker sores, which led to its being nearly collected into oblivion. At one time more goldthread was sold in Boston than any other native plant, and it was most likely sold under its other common name of canker root. Luckily it has made a good comeback and I see lots of it.

New goldthread leaves are a bright, glossy lime green but darken as they age and by winter will be very dark green. They’ll hold their color under the snow all winter and look similar to wild strawberries until late April or early May when new leaves and flowers will appear.

Robin’s plantain (Erigeron pulchellus) is the earliest of the fleabanes to bloom in this area. Its inch and a half diameter flowers are larger than many fleabane blossoms and its foot high stalks are shorter. One way to identify this plant is by its basal rosette of very hairy, oval leaves. The stem and stem leaves (cauline) are also hairy. The flowers can be white to pink to lavender and are made up of ray florets surrounding yellow disk florets in the center. These plants almost always grow in large colonies and often come up in lawns. They’re a good indicator of where the flower lovers among us live because at this time of year you can see many neatly mown lawns with islands of unmown, blossoming fleabanes. If you are one of those people who mow around this native fleabane you might want to visit a nursery, because there are also many cultivated varieties of this plant.

This is the first appearance of skunk currant (Ribes glandulosum) on this blog. I know a place where hundreds of these plants grow but I’ve never seen one blooming so I was never sure what they were. I’ve read that the plant gets its common name from the odor given off by its ripe dark red berries, which doesn’t sound too appealing but they are said to be very tasty. If you can get past the smell, I assume. This is a very hairy plant; even its fruit has hairs. The Native Ojibwa people used the root of skunk currant to ease back pain but it is not a favorite of foresters or timber harvesters because it carries white pine blister rust, which can kill pine trees.

Another name for Jack in the pulpit is Indian turnip (Arisaema triphyllum) because Native Americans knew how to cook the poisonous root to remove the toxic calcium oxalate crystals. They called the plant “tcika-tape” which translates as “bad sick,” but they knew how to use it and not get sick. They also used the root medicinally for a variety of ailments, including as a treatment for sore eyes. This plant is also called bog onion because the root looks like a small onion and it grows in low, damp places. It is in the arum family and is similar to the “lords and ladies” plant found in the U.K.

I always lift the hood to see the beautiful stripes and to see if Jack is being pollinated. Jack is the black, club shaped spadix surrounded by the showy spathe, which is the pulpit. The plant has a fungal odor that attracts gnats and other insects and if they do their job Jack will become a bunch of bright red berries that white tail deer love to come by and snack on.

I love lilacs so they always have a place included here. Many people here in New Hampshire think that lilacs are native to the state but they aren’t. They (Syringa vulgaris) were first imported from England to the garden of then Governor Benning Wentworth in 1750 and chosen as the state flower in 1919 because they were said to “symbolize that hardy character of the men and women of the Granite State.” Rejected were apple blossoms, purple aster, wood lily, Mayflower, goldenrod, wild pasture rose, evening primrose and buttercup. The pink lady’s slipper is our state native wild flower.

Until I saw this photo I never realized how suede-like lilac flowers look. I was too busy sucking the sweet nectar out of them as a boy to notice, I guess.

Lily of the valley always reminds me of my grandmother because I can remember bringing her fistfuls of them along with dandelions, violets and anything else I saw. She would always be delighted with my rapidly wilting bouquet and would immediately put it in a jelly jar of water. These plants are extremely toxic but I never once thought of eating or putting any part of one in my mouth, so I hope all of the mothers and grandmothers out there will give the little ones a chance to see your face light up as they thrust out a chubby fist full of wilted lily of the valley blossoms. I can tell you that, though it might seem such a small thing, it stays with you throughout life. It also teaches a child a good lesson about the great joy to be found in giving.

It’s time to say goodbye to purple trilliums (Trillium erectum,) which are another of our spring ephemerals that seem almost like falling stars, so brief is their time with us. You can tell that this trillium is on its way out by the way its petals darken from red to dark purple, unlike the painted trillium we saw earlier with petals that lighten as they age.

Fringed polygala (Polygala paucifolia) flowers often grow in pairs like those shown in the photo. Each blossom is made up of five sepals and two petals. Two of the petals form a tube and two of the sepals form the “wings.” The little fringe like structure at the end of the tube is part of the third petal, which is mostly hidden. A lot has to happen for this little flower to become pollinated. When a heavy enough insect (like a bumblebee) lands on the fringed part, the third sepal drops down to create an opening so the insect can enter the tube, where it finds the flower’s reproductive parts and gets dusted with pollen. That pollination happens at all seems a bit miraculous but in case it doesn’t, this flower has insurance; there are unseen flowers underground that can self-pollinate without the help of insects.

I tried to get a “bee’s eye view” of one of the flowers, which also go by the name of gaywings. What beautiful things they are; I could sit and admire them all day.

I believe the world is incomprehensibly beautiful — an endless prospect of magic and wonder. ~Ansel Adams

Thanks for stopping in. Have a safe and happy Memorial Day!

Read Full Post »

Late April / Early May Flowers

Posted in Nature, Wildflowers, tagged Bloodroot, Bluets, Canon SX40 HS, Dandelion, Early Spring Plants, Female Box Elder Flowers, Keene, Lilac, Magnolia, Native Plants, Nature, New Hampshire, NH, NH Wildflowers, Panasonic Lumix DMC-527, Plantain Leaved Sedge, Spring, Tulips, Vinca Minor, Willow Flowers, Yellow Trout Lily on May 2, 2015| 49 Comments »

The lime green, sticky pistils of female box elder flowers (Acer negundo) appear along with the tree’s leaves, but a few days after the male flowers have fully opened, I’ve noticed. Box elders have male flowers on one tree and female flowers on another, unlike red maples which can have both on one tree. Several Native American tribes made sugar from this tree’s sap and the earliest known example of a Native American flute, dating from 620-670 AD, was made from its wood.

One day I went walking near mown areas looking for bluets (Houstonia caerulea) but found none. Two days later they were everywhere. I always look for the darkest shade of blue for a photo but the flowers can be almost white to dark blue, and I’ve read that they open white and darken to various shades of blue as they age. No matter what shade of blue they are, they always have a yellow center. They are tiny things; each flower isn’t much bigger than a pea. Another name for the plant is “Quaker ladies” but nobody seems to know exactly why. Other names include innocence, blue-eyed babies, Venus’ pride, Quaker bonnets, and bright eyes. They’re cheery little things and I’m always happy to see them.

I can just imagine the conversation that must have gone on:
Her: Sweetie, there’s a strange man lying on the sidewalk out front, taking pictures of our stone wall.
Him: He’s not taking pictures of the wall; he’s taking pictures of the dandelion growing in it.
Her: But why would he be doing that?
Him: How should I know? He’s obviously some kind of a nut. Just ignore him and maybe he’ll go away.

Sure, we’ve all seen dandelions, but have we ever stopped to really look at one?

We finally had a day sunny enough to coax the bloodroot blossoms (Sanguinaria canadensis) into opening fully, but by the time I remembered to visit them it had clouded over enough to make them want to close up again. I got there in time to see them start wrapping their leaves around themselves, preparing to close.

But one flower remained fully opened and the lighting was perfect to show the veining in its petals. I’ve learned by trial and error that too much sunlight or the use of a flash will make such subtle details disappear, and you’ll be left with flat white petals. That might not seem like a big deal but if someone who wants to publish a wildflower guide looks at your photo it will be a big deal to them and your photo won’t be chosen.

The magnolias have been stunning this year and I wish I could offer up their fragrance as well as a photo. For a very short time each spring magnolia and lilac fragrances overlap and I always think that, if heaven has a fragrance, it will come from the blending of those two flowers.

I like a challenge and there isn’t much that’s more challenging to a nature photographer than a red flower. They are very hard to get a good photo of for reasons I don’t fully understand, so I was surprised when I saw that this one of a red tulip came out good enough to show here. I won’t bother to tell you how many weren’t good enough.

Willows (Salix) are done flowering for the most part, but you can still find a bloom or two if you’re willing to search a bit. Willows are one of those early spring flowers that don’t get a lot of fanfare but I love the promise of spring that they show.

The inner bark and leaves of some willows contain salicylic acid, which is the active ingredient in aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid). Native Americans chewed or made tea from the willow’s leaves and inner bark to relieve fever or toothaches, headaches, or arthritis, and that is why the willow is often called “toothache tree.” It was a very important medicine that no healer would have been without.

Almost immediately after I told Sara in my last flower post that Pennsylvania sedge was the only sedge that bloomed before the leaves came out on the trees I stumbled upon this clump of plantain leaved sedge (Carex plantaginea), growing in an old stone wall. “When will I ever learn?” was the question I asked myself. There is no such thing as always or never when it comes to nature and every time I use one of those words on this blog nature almost immediately shows me how wrong I am. In this case I was happy to be proven wrong though, because I’ve never seen this beautiful sedge.

The prominent midrib, two lateral veins, maroon bases, and puckered look of the leaves are all used as identifying features for plantain leaved sedge. The leaves can be up to a foot long and an inch wide and I can’t think of another sedge that has leaves that look quite like these. The flowers stalks (culms) were about 4 inches tall and had wispy, white female (pistillate) flowers below the terminal male (staminate) flowers. Sedge flowers are actually called spikelets and the stems that bear them are triangular, hence the old saying “sedges have edges.” I can’t speak for the rarity of this plant but this is the only one I’ve ever seen and it isn’t listed in the book Grasses: An Identification Guide, by Lauren Brown. I’ve read that it likes cool shady places where the humidity is relatively high. There is a stream just a few feet from where this one grows.

Vinca (Vinca minor) is one of those invasive plants from Europe that have been here long enough to have erased any memories of them having once crossed the Atlantic on the deck of a wooden ship. Vinca was a plant that was given by one neighbor to another along with lilacs and peonies, and I’ve seen all three blooming beautifully near old cellar holes off in the middle of nowhere. But the word vinca means “to bind” in Latin, and that’s what the wiry stems do. They grow thickly together and form an impenetrable mat that other plants can’t grow through, and I know of large areas with nothing but vinca growing in them. But all in all it is nowhere near as aggressive as Oriental bittersweet or winged euonymus, so we enjoy it’s beautiful violet purple flowers and coexist.

The trout lilies (Erythronium americanum) have just opened and seeing a forest floor carpeted with them is something you don’t soon forget. I’ve read that some large colonies can be as much as 300 years old. Each plant grows from a single bulb and can take 7-10 years to produce a flower, so if you see a large colony of flowering plants you know it has been there for a while. Young plants have a single leaf and then grow a second when they are ready to bloom, so you see many more leaves than flowers.

Trout lilies are in the lily family and it’s easy to see why; they look just like a miniature Canada lily. The six stamens in the blossom start out bright yellow but quickly turn brown and start shedding pollen. Three erect stigmata will catch any pollen that visiting insects might bring. Nectar is produced at the base of the petals and sepals (tepals) as it is in all members of the lily family, and attracts several kinds of bees. The plant will produce a light green, oval, three part seed capsule 6-8 weeks after blooming if pollination has been successful. The seeds of trout lilies are dispersed by ants which eat their rich, fatty appendages and leave the seeds to grow into bulbs.

Trout lily flowers have three petals and three sepals. All are yellow on the inside but the sepals on many flowers are a brown-bronze color on the outside. No matter how you look at it it’s a beautiful little thing, but I think it’s even more so from the back side.

This is a little hint of what will come in the next flower post.

We do not want merely to see beauty… we want something else which can hardly be put into words- to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it. ~C.S. Lewis

Thanks for stopping in.

Read Full Post »

Things I’ve Seen

Posted in Nature, Things I've Seen, tagged Beech Leaves, Black Sedge, Bracken Fern, Canon SX40 HS, Common Sedge, Eastern Larch Cone, Garter Snake, Keene, Lilac, Native Plants, Nature, New Hampshire, NH, Painted Turtle, Panasonic Lumix DMC-527, Rattlesnake Weed, Shagbark Hickory, Solomon's Seal, Spring, Staghorn Sumac on May 17, 2014| 59 Comments »

Behind every stone, on every branch and in every puddle, beauty can be found. This tiny new larch cone (Larix laricina) is to me as beautiful as any flower.

Since I was just a boy one of my favorite things about spring has been watching lilac buds swell and finally open. It’s a simple thing, but for me it’s part of the magic of life that makes it so worth living.

Does an emerging plant make a hole in one of last year’s leaves, or is the hole already there and the plant grows up through it? These are questions that came to mind as I sat pondering how every one of this Solomon seal’s leaves (Polygonatum biflorum) got trapped by a hole in a leaf. Will the plant be able to break free of the leaf and live as it was meant to, or will it be forever trapped by it?

The nest in this photo was baseball size and hanging from a maple branch. I don’t know what made it but the insects buzzing all around it looked like hornets or yellow jackets. The really odd thing about it is how it looks more like a bird’s nest than a hornet or wasp nest. I’ve never heard of an insect using birch bark to build a nest. Could it be that the wasps or hornets were attacking a bird inside its nest? Another forest mystery.

This painted turtle seemed to be having some trouble with its shell. Since seeing it I’ve read that turtles can have all kinds of shell problems, including rot and fungus.

My grandmother was so afraid of snakes that she would almost convulse with revulsion at the mere mention of the word. You’d think someone had run their fingers down a chalkboard to watch her. I think that’s why I became so interested in snakes at an early age. I wanted to see what it was that scared her so badly-she who wasn’t afraid of anything. It sure was a good thing she wasn’t with me when I saw this garter snake. It was a cloudy day and he was too sluggish to slither away, so I had a chance to get a couple of photos. My grandmother would have jumped in the river before the shutter had even clicked.

A pillow for thee will I bring.
Stuffed with down of angel’s wing.
~Richard Crashaw

If you live in New England and see a fern with a single tall stem and three branches at its tip it is a bracken fern (Pteridium aquilinum.) Bracken ferns often grow in large, dense colonies with few other plants present and this is because it releases chemicals that inhibit the growth of many other plants. Plants compete for light, water, and nutrients but bracken fern has found a way to almost eliminate the completion.

Most tree leaves start life colored something other than green and that’s because they don’t need chlorophyll at this stage because they aren’t photosynthesizing. Production of the green pigment chlorophyll requires plenty of light and warmth so if spring weather happens to be cloudy and cool, you might see reddish leaves on the trees for a while. The crimson leaves on this staghorn sumac (Rhus typhina) have just started unfurling. This year, with sunshine and warmth, it has taken them less than a day to turn green.

The branch that these pine cones grew on died before they could mature and now they seem frozen in time, as if they’re petrified, curled and pointed like animal claws.

The rarest plant I know of is rattlesnake weed (Hieracium venosum). I’ve seen one plant in my lifetime and this is it. It has grown in this spot for some time but didn’t bloom last year and I wondered if it would even appear this year, but here it is. It is in the hawkweed family and its flowers look just like yellow hawkweed, but its purple veined foliage is what makes it so unusual and so beautiful. I’m hoping it will produce plenty of seeds this year and that they will grow into more plants. Its common name comes from the old belief that it only grew where there were rattlesnakes.

I like to watch for grasses and sedges at this time of year because many flower now and they can be very beautiful. I think this one might be common or black sedge (Carex nigra). I like its scaly, almost reptilian appearance. I found it growing beside a small pond.

I can understand why flowers have certain colors, and mushrooms and even slime molds, but it’s hard to even guess why the insides of the bud scales of the shagbark hickory tree (Carya ovata) have such extraordinary colors. They spend their entire existence closed tightly around the tender leaves and then open for a day or two before falling from the branch, so what purpose can such colors serve? I like to think that some things on this earth are here simply to delight the eye of the lucky person who stumbles upon them, and maybe these bud scales are a good example of that.

Looking at beauty in the world is the first step of purifying the mind. ~Amit Ray

Thanks for coming by.

Read Full Post »

Things I’ve Seen

Posted in Nature, Things I've Seen, tagged Apple Moss, Ashuelot River, Black Oak, Canon SX40 HS, Early Spring Plants, Hairy Cap Moss, Keene, Lady Fern, Lilac, Native Plants, Nature, New Hampshire, Oak Galls, Oriental Bittersweet, Panasonic Lumix DMC-SZ7, Pennsylvania Sedge, Red Elderberry, Red Maple, Rock Foam, Spring, Virginia Creeper on April 30, 2014| 42 Comments »

Along the river creamy yellow male staminate flowers bloom above the wispy, feather like, white female pistillate flowers of Pennsylvania sedge (Carex pensylvanica.) This is a very early bloomer that usually appears at just about the same time as spring beauties and trout lilies. As the plant ages the male flowers will turn light brown and the female flowers, if pollinated by the wind, will bear seed.

When it isn’t blooming Pennsylvania sedge is easily mistaken for a course grass. I find it along the river and also in the woods under trees. It doesn’t seem too fussy about where it grows and will tolerate shade.

Tendrils of Virginia creeper first exude a sticky substance before expanding into a disc shaped pad that essentially glues itself to the object that the vine wants to climb-in this case, a dead tree limb. Once the adhesive discs at the tendril ends are stuck in place the tendrils coil themselves tightly to hold the vine in place. Charles Darwin discovered that each adhesive pad can support two pounds. Just imagine how much weight a mature vine with many thousands of these sticky pads could support. It’s no wonder that Virginia creeper can pull the siding off a house.

Invasive oriental bittersweet (Celastrus orbiculatus) doesn’t have tendrils so it becomes a tendril over its entire length and winds its way up trees, wires, and even grass stems, as the photo shows. I’ve seen old bittersweet vines as big around as my leg.

Lady fern (Athyrium filix-femina) fiddleheads are about 2 inches tall. The dark brown scales on their smooth lower stems help to identify this one. This fern doesn’t like windy places, so if you find a shaded dell where a grove of lady fern grows it’s safe to assume that it doesn’t ever get very windy there.

The wind has brought plenty of pollen from the male flowers so now the pistillate female flowers of red maple (Acer rubrum) have begun turning into seeds, which are called samaras. These are one of the smallest seeds in the maple family. It is estimated that a single tree 12 inches in diameter can produce nearly a million seeds, and if the tree is fertilized for 2 years seed production can increase by 10 times. It’s no wonder that red maple is getting a reputation for being a weed tree.

It’s easy to see how apple moss (Bartramia pomiformis) got its common name. This moss grows its almost spherical spore capsules (sporangia) very early in spring. As they age the capsules turn brown but it pays to watch closely because some spore capsules will turn red between their green and brown stages, and that’s when these tiny orbs really look like apples. It’s an event in nature that most people never get to see.

The inner bark of the black oak (Quercus velutina) shows why this tree was once called yellow oak. Native Americans made yellow dye from this bark and also used it medicinally. The yellow pigment is called quercitron and was sold in a bright yellow dye in Europe as late as the 1940s. Black oak is a member of the red oak family and easily cross breeds with red oaks to form many natural hybrids.

Elderberry flowers really aren’t much to look at (or to smell) but the flower buds of this red elderberry (Sambucus racemosa) are very beautiful. Since the flowers are white, plum purple is a very odd color for the buds. They remind me of lilac buds.

Of course, after comparing red elderberry buds to lilac buds I had to show those as well. This is a French hybrid, deep purple lilac that was given to me by a friend many years ago. Its bud scales have just broken to reveal the flower buds tucked inside. This is part of the magic that is spring, and something I love to watch happen.

This is the strangest gall I’ve seen. It looks (and feels) like a group of small deflated balloons. It was growing on an oak limb and I haven’t been able to identify it.

NOTE: Helpful readers have identified this gall as the oak fig gall, caused by the wasp Trigonaspis quercusforticorne. They are specific to the white oak family, apparently. Thank you to David and Charley for the identification. I learned a lot.

Rock Foam (Stereocaulon saxatile) is a fragile looking lichen but it is really quite tough. As their common name suggests, they are found on rocks and boulders, usually in full sun. These lichens are often used as a prospecting tool because a simple lab test will show what type of rock they grow on and what minerals, like copper or magnesium, are present.

A closer look at rock foam lichen. When it is dry it feels as rough as it looks.

I’m seeing a lot of orange oak leaves this spring and I’m not sure what makes them turn this color. It must be some kind of bacteria or fungus.

This hairy cap moss (Polytrichum commune) with its water droplet reminded me that flowers aren’t the only beautiful things to see in spring. There is plenty there for the seeing if only we take the time to look.

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeing new landscapes, but in having new eyes. ~ Marcel Proust

Thanks for stopping in.

Read Full Post »

Older Posts »

New Hampshire Garden Solutions

Exploring Nature in New Hampshire

Posts Tagged ‘Lilac’

Early May Flowers

Mid May Flowers

New Hampshire has four native cherry trees: black cherry (Prunus serotina), choke cherry (Prunus virginiana), pin cherry (Prunus pensylvanica), and wild American plum (Prunus americana). The blossoms in the above photo are pin cherry blossoms. Choke cherries have just started blossoming as well.

This one I’ve never seen before, so I’m going to need help with it. I found it growing in a local park so it is obviously a cultivated garden plant but I can’t seem to find it, either in books or online.

It’s a very pretty plant that stands maybe a foot tall and the flowers look like they belong in the legume family along with peas, beans, locusts and lupines. If you happen to know its name I’d love to hear from you.

I looked inside a tulip and had a hard time looking away from it. It was a beautiful thing.

I was surprised to see clusters of redbud flowers surrounding pruned off limbs. They seemed to be coming right out of the bark of the tree. I’m also always surprised by how small the pea like purple flowers are on a redbud but the tree makes up for it by producing plenty of them.

Silently a flower blooms,
In silence it falls away;
Yet here now, at this moment, at this place,
The world of the flower, the whole of the world is blooming.
This is the talk of the flower, the truth of the blossom:
The glory of eternal life is fully shining here.
~ Zenkei Shibayama

Thanks for coming by. I hope there are many flowers in your lives.

Mid May Flowers

I thought I’d illustrate our weather by showing these grape hyacinths, which should be done blooming by now. I saw the first ones blooming just a little over a month ago. Other bulbs like tulips and daffodils are also still blooming so they must be enjoying the cool, damp weather.

But it doesn’t matter where apples come from, because the fragrance is wonderful. Apple blossoms were one of my grandmother’s favorites and I remember bringing her arm loads of flowering branches when I was a boy. They were all you could smell in her house for days after.

Individual creeping phlox flowers are quite pretty but I doubt many people bother to look at them. They see the mass display but not the individuals responsible for it.

Just after many other magnolias lose their flowers this one with tulip shaped flowers starts blooming. Its name is “Jane” and though I’m not crazy about the flower shape I love its color. It’s later bloom time means less chance of damage by frost.

The word “sessile” in the name describes how the leaves of a sessile leaved bellwort lie flat against the stem, with no leaf stalk. The leaves are also elliptic and are wider in the middle than they are on either end.

A forest floor carpeted with sessile leaved bellworts makes an unforgettable sight. Many tens of thousands of them grow along the Ashuelot River in Keene.

The leaves and flowers are edible, and if you’ve ever had vermouth you’ve had a splash of pulmonaria because it is one of the ingredients. The plant does well in shade and has flowers of blue, pink, white, purple and red.

I finally saw the wild columbines (Aquilegia canadensis) blooming and thankfully Ii was a nice uneventful hike out to see them. I’ve found that my bear encounter of a couple of weeks ago has taken a lot of the shine off this hike. It’s hard to relax when you know you need to be on your guard.

The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera. ~Dorothea Lange

Thanks for stopping in.

Buds

Buds

Survivors

More Mid May Flowers

Late April / Early May Flowers

Things I’ve Seen

Things I’ve Seen

Follow Blog via Email

Recent Posts

Archives

Visitor Count

Favorite Links

Exploring Nature in New Hampshire

Posts Tagged ‘Lilac’

New Hampshire has four native cherry trees: black cherry (Prunus serotina), choke cherry (Prunus virginiana), pin cherry (Prunus pensylvanica), and wild American plum (Prunus americana). The blossoms in the above photo are pin cherry blossoms. Choke cherries have just started blossoming as well.

This one I’ve never seen before, so I’m going to need help with it. I found it growing in a local park so it is obviously a cultivated garden plant but I can’t seem to find it, either in books or online.

It’s a very pretty plant that stands maybe a foot tall and the flowers look like they belong in the legume family along with peas, beans, locusts and lupines. If you happen to know its name I’d love to hear from you.

I looked inside a tulip and had a hard time looking away from it. It was a beautiful thing.

I was surprised to see clusters of redbud flowers surrounding pruned off limbs. They seemed to be coming right out of the bark of the tree. I’m also always surprised by how small the pea like purple flowers are on a redbud but the tree makes up for it by producing plenty of them.

Silently a flower blooms, In silence it falls away; Yet here now, at this moment, at this place, The world of the flower, the whole of the world is blooming. This is the talk of the flower, the truth of the blossom: The glory of eternal life is fully shining here. ~ Zenkei Shibayama

Thanks for coming by. I hope there are many flowers in your lives.

I thought I’d illustrate our weather by showing these grape hyacinths, which should be done blooming by now. I saw the first ones blooming just a little over a month ago. Other bulbs like tulips and daffodils are also still blooming so they must be enjoying the cool, damp weather.

But it doesn’t matter where apples come from, because the fragrance is wonderful. Apple blossoms were one of my grandmother’s favorites and I remember bringing her arm loads of flowering branches when I was a boy. They were all you could smell in her house for days after.

Individual creeping phlox flowers are quite pretty but I doubt many people bother to look at them. They see the mass display but not the individuals responsible for it.

Just after many other magnolias lose their flowers this one with tulip shaped flowers starts blooming. Its name is “Jane” and though I’m not crazy about the flower shape I love its color. It’s later bloom time means less chance of damage by frost.

The word “sessile” in the name describes how the leaves of a sessile leaved bellwort lie flat against the stem, with no leaf stalk. The leaves are also elliptic and are wider in the middle than they are on either end.

A forest floor carpeted with sessile leaved bellworts makes an unforgettable sight. Many tens of thousands of them grow along the Ashuelot River in Keene.

The leaves and flowers are edible, and if you’ve ever had vermouth you’ve had a splash of pulmonaria because it is one of the ingredients. The plant does well in shade and has flowers of blue, pink, white, purple and red.

I finally saw the wild columbines (Aquilegia canadensis) blooming and thankfully Ii was a nice uneventful hike out to see them. I’ve found that my bear encounter of a couple of weeks ago has taken a lot of the shine off this hike. It’s hard to relax when you know you need to be on your guard.

The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera. ~Dorothea Lange

Thanks for stopping in.

Follow Blog via Email

Recent Posts

Archives

Visitor Count

Favorite Links

Silently a flower blooms,
In silence it falls away;
Yet here now, at this moment, at this place,
The world of the flower, the whole of the world is blooming.
This is the talk of the flower, the truth of the blossom:
The glory of eternal life is fully shining here.
~ Zenkei Shibayama