Don's Blog Peaches and Cream 8-11-21

I would not want you to think this trip has been all peaches and cream.

This is what we have been dealing with. The haze from the California wildfires has been carried to us

by the jet stream. Luckily we only smelled smoke one day.

It has been gradually clearing and lately we can almost see the mountains.

It actually is improving.

Don's Blog Hiking away 8-11-21

I love being on the trail every day. Yesterday I did a 4 mile hike by a place called Gypsy Ground that my grandson Will told me about three years ago. It is always fun to put the story and the place together.

The place was magical. The most amazing aspect was the surrounding SILENCE on the entire trip which

was in a deep valley not far from town.  

This deep purple Rocky Mountain  Penstemon (Penstemon strictus) was splendid.

Don's Blog Bighorn Sheep 8-9-21

The signature animal of RMNP is the Rocky Mountain Bighorn Sheep. The rut is late in the year and after a 6 month gestation the ewes give birth to one lamb each in May and June. On the Estes Park side of the park the rams are seen mainly down below the tundra in the fall. The ewes and lambs come down from the safety of the heights of the tundra to get nutrients from the 'SheepLakes' near the Fall River entrance. Although I have seen rams in this area butting heads in the fall I have never seen ewes and lambs here - UNTIL TODAY.

As we drove by we saw an extraordinary display of bighorn ewe and lamb domesticity. They were eating vegetation by the left hand lake as a large group. There were many lambs. The rams do not show up until the fall when it is time to reproduce.

You can see the small prongs of the mother.

A baby growing up.

They decided to move from the left to the right lake.

It was exciting to see the whole herd on the move.

They stuck together like the caribou herds in the arctic tundra.

Their movement still excites me. What a  rare thrill -the first time ever in all these years.

There is something new every time we visit.

Don's Blog Upper Beaver Meadows 8-9-21

Upper Beaver Meados was closed the other day for a helicopter evacuation. Today it was open and less crowded

than usual. The trails are amazing.

The trail was lined with false golden aster (Heterotheca) which has just begun blooming.

The trail also had some other yellow flowers.

This is greater creeping spearwort (Ranunculus) a buttercup.

and narrowleaf evening primrose (Oenethea)

and even  blue and purple flowers:

and purple locoweed (Oxitropis)

Eating this one will make you loco.

Don's Blog First Trip to RMNP 8-7-21

Here are some of the wildflowers from today.

Cleome: We have these spider flowers in our home garden also.

Blazing Star (Liatrice)

Common Yarrow (Achillea)

Harebell (Campanula) We watched fascinated as small bees would enter the bell opening and the 

flower would descend 4-5 inches on its stalk and when the bee left, the flower would 

immediately spring back up.

Don's Blog First Trip To RMNP 8-7-21

We finally got into the park using a ticket I had purchased on the internet in St louis. (Recreation.gov.RMNP.Timed entry)

We enjoyed a picnic lunch by a cold mountain stream and a brief trail hike at EndoValley with our son and his wife.

This little side stream seems to be coming out of a tree root.

There were mushrooms. Can anyone identify this one.

And of course multiple wild flowers which will be shown in the addendum to this blog.

Flower for the Day Oriental Lily 7-22-21

Just when I had given up on the oriental lilies this beauty showed up with multiple blooms.

They were in a difficult to access part of the gnome garden so I wonder if the deer have been munching the others.

Haiku of an Oriental Master

Petals I amass
with such tenderness
prick me to the quick.

―Kobayashi Issa, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Flower for the Day Hydrangea 7-20-21

In the green garden there are several hydrangea bushes. One produces white blossoms only.

Another has produced no more than one blossom for several years. This year it has produced multiple blossoms of many colors.

In most species the flowers are white but in some species, especially H. macrophylla can be blue, red, pink,

 light purple, or dark purple. In these species, floral color change occurs due to the presence of aluminum ions which are available or tied up depending upon the soil pH. For H. macrophylla  the flower color can be determined by the relative acidity of the soil: an acidic soil (pH below 7), will have available aluminum ions and typically produce flowers that are blue to purple, whereas an alkaline soil (pH above 7) will tie up aluminum ions and result in pink  flowers. This is caused by a color change of the flower pigments in the presence of aluminum ions which can be taken up into the plants. Lowering the pH of potting soils or mixes usually does not change the flower color to blue, because these soils have no aluminum ions. The ability to blue or pink a hydrangea is also influenced by the cultivar. Some plants are selected for their ability to be blued, while others are bred and selected to be red, pink or white. This does not explain why my hydrangea was able to produce app these colors. 

Hydrangea Influence

Hydrangea Influence Pull of gravity drawn on the senses, hydrangea scent 

Fragrance bliss, orgasmic burst, flowering forth 

Explains beauty one petal at a time in naked white 

Flavors come on nasal whiffs in flight 

Fragile buds nod to blossoms under the glacial moon 

 Delicately delicious invisible friends seen once again 

Spread up ahead on garden paths 

On wings of spring 

Past the river, nature at its best begins 

When growing wild in the woods 

Blossoms form, born perfect just in time 

 Birth of aroma, breath inhales, forgets to let it go 

 Love on the stem and leaves fill up imaginations 

Displayed on gray days, nature dances, pollen laughs 

Garden mesmerized, on its knees, satiated under breeze 

Earth submits, to the tease, seasons color strokes 

 Memory knows flowers from the dirt 

Moves the Earth to drink it in 

Discerning, blown open, flirting with the wind 

Without a voice without a sound on softer ground Spoken only on the breeze in leisure 

Tranquil undergrowth abounds 

 Honey layered, thick as lust 

Purer than a woman's womb 

Thrusting forth perfumes 

Hydrangeas fill the need of spring 

Shimmer under moon light in naked white 

Light up mid night for those who want to know 

 Aromas are not allowed to lie in flower beds 

They seek out noses on their own and spread 

Hydrangeas know exactly what to do 

 While filling up exhausted souls, exhaling truth 

Before the beauty, love comes first

 Earl Schumacker  2015

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Flower for the Day Cleome 7-17-21

We came upon cleome (Cleome brassleriana) in a nearby garden more than thirty years ago. We both fell for it and have had some in our front garden ever since. It is also known as spider plant,spider weed, and bee plant. DNA studies have moved the plant into the Brassicaceae family.

Cleome is useful in the botanical study of carbon fixation as it participates the evolutionary change from C-3 to C-4 carbon fixation in

photosynthesis. You will remember that photosynthesis includes conversion of light energy into chemical energy for plant metabolism.

Sorry - none of the cleome poems made the cut. My  aim is for a poem to stop you in your pursuit of life and add to its

magnificence.

Flower for the Day Red Hot Poker 7-15-21

This red hot poker (Kniphofia uvaria) is in the lily family (Liliaceae) and is also known as poker plant and torch lily. The plant starts out 

orange or red and gradually turns yellow. They have narrow grass like leaves and the plants produce spikes of upright, brightly bi-coloured flowers well above the foliage. The flowers produce copious nectar. 

The Cowladder Stanzas

Not from a weather direction

black cockatoos come crying over

as unflapping as Bleriot monoplanes

to crash in pine tops for the cones.

 

Young dogs, neighbours' dogs

across the creek, bark, chained

off the cows, choked off play, bark

untiring as a nightsick baby, yap

milking times to dark, plead

ute-dancing dope-eye dogs.

 

Red-hot pokers up and out

of their tussock. Kniphofia flowers

overlapping many scarlet jubes

form rockets on a stick.

Ignition's mimed by yellow petticoats.

 

Like all its kind

Python has a hare lip

through which it aims its tongue

at eye-bursting Hare…..

Les Murray