common_nature | Entries tagged with plants: shrubs

Taken on 16 July 2023 at 19:27 US Eastern Daylight Savings Time.

Bunnies are of course going to favor weedy green lawns over elegant stone yards punctuated with waxy sculptural ornamentals. This one looks like an Eastern Cottontail (Sylvilagus floridanus); Marsh Rabbits (S. palustris) (1), tend to have shorter ears, and my neighborhood strikes me as a bit too far from the water to attract them during the dry season.

It’s on alert, reacting sensibly to the arrival of a member of the deadliest of the Thousand, and so this was the only shot I was able to get before it went PATWINNNG! under the seagrape bed (the round-leaved shrub at center right, bordered by white river rocks.)

(1) Today I Learned the scientific name of the Lower Keys Marsh Rabbit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvilagus_palustris_hefneri

Yes; that Hugh Hefner funded endangered rabbit research, and was commemorated accordingly.

full_metal_ox

I sure do!

I’m something of an astronomy nerd; you have to understand that the great solar eclipse of 8 April 2024 was something I’d been counting down to my whole life. In my native Dayton, Ohio, I’d gotten to witness the strange begrimed 40-watt sunlight (1) and dappled crescent shadows of the partial solar eclipses of 10 May 1994 and 21 August 2017, after having gotten a fleeting confirmatory glance through SolarShields under welder’s goggles: the exercise was a bit like hunting basilisks or Medusa.

Another point is that I’m acutely homesick for the seasonal markers of the place where I spent 90+% of my life: the violets and wild chives and flowering crabapples, and the two equinoctial yellows of Moraine honeylocusts: neon chartreuse foliage in the spring, and in the fall flaming saffron—turning to orange piles of cornflake crunch beneath the feet. Even the lawn weeds here are unfamiliar.

Until a couple years in advance—by which time it was too late—I had not anticipated that, by the time the total solar eclipse at long last came to Dayton, I would be gone; behold the southern Gulf Coast of Florida’s experience of the Grand Portentuous Celestial Event.

( Continue. )

Current Music: ”Snuff Out The Light”.

ysabetwordsmith

This afternoon I went outside intending to fasten the decorative wagonwheel, but it was half-buried under snow. I noticed the view looked pretty, though, so I went back for my camera and took pictures instead.

( Walk with me ... )

Current Mood: accomplished

ysabetwordsmith

The sun came out, so now the snow sparkles and much wildlife sign is visible. This set of pictures shows the north end of the house yard, driveway, and Midwinter Grove. Cottontail rabbits like this area, as shown by their tracks. (See also House Yard, Savanna, and Back Toward the House.)

( Walk with me ... )

Current Mood: accomplished

ysabetwordsmith

Here are more pictures, mostly from the savanna and prairie garden. (See also the House Yard and South Lot, Midwinter Grove, and Heading Back Toward the House.)

( Walk with me ... )

Current Mood: accomplished

ysabetwordsmith

For our Yule ritual this year, we planted our new hollies in the Midwinter Grove.

( Walk with me ... )

Current Mood: accomplished

ysabetwordsmith

I took some pictures of the yard and the new holly bushes before planting.

( Walk with me ... )

Current Mood: busy

ysabetwordsmith

Today I took some pictures of the sprouting flowers in my yard.

( Read more... )

Current Mood: accomplished

yourlibrarian

It's warmed up this week, supposed to be over 80 today in fact. But it seems that the hummingbirds have migrated and the trees and bushes are agreeing that it's about time to be changing clothes.