Snapshot (Repost) - Cream to Green

Bradford Pear, Cream to Green

Southern Oak Catkins

a mountain Maple type going to seed

Red Maple, going to seed

Mountain Maple, or Beach Maple going to seed


Snapshot Week 10: 3/8-3/14 - Cream to Green (Repost 2009)

Note: It appears we are about a week behind last year in the bloom cycle, so this should give a sense of what we will see this week (3/22/2010  with the Brads just now gowing green.)

The great revolution this week was only visible to the highly observant. A vast spreading but as yet largely unrealized green is sneaking into every blade and branch. The overall impact when looking at the woods is still one of brush and bone, but there are signs that these too are ready to rage.

This week was cool (COLD) and wet, hence many things stayed kind of like they were last week. The brads are still holding bloom though waxing green. I expect them to go fully limon during the week of March 15.

The maple too are in revolution, as the Silver-tip, the Red, and various Mountain Maple types are in full seed force. (Only the Sugar Maples appear to hold back, not even given to flower.)

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Many of the Oaks, including the Southern Red and various water oaks are putting out catkins (a brown-green floral worm). Still, I have to see any catkin action on the massive Pin Oaks or various White oaks, many of which hold fall brown.

Other action: Saturday, March 14th marked the first day of the Wye Mountain Daffodil fest.

Lots of Henbit and lawn flower activity.

The overall effect was one of wet, green under surge.

Oops, almost forgot. HUGE week for the Red Bud, Peach, and Plum. Will post a Redbud page later this week.

Other things still seen:

Clatonia - everywhere

forsythia/japonica blooms (mixed with green)

roange berries (harder to see as the world greens)

Lawn Dainties

Lawn Dainties. (Repost from last year, - Both Claytonia and Hustonia are going strong as of mid March 2010

After a reader correction I am going with Claytonia for the larger top bloom. Thanks Tom for the assist. It is much appreciated.

http://www.missouriplants.com/Whiteopp/Claytonia_virginica_page.html

The smaller deep purple/blue flower is of the Hustonia family, though I cannot tell from the Missouri flower guide if it is Hustaona minima (it is small), or if it is Hustonia pusilla or Hustonia Caerulea.

In either case these are flowers, that if they loomed large would astonish us, but we are content to crush them under our feet.

Henbit

Repost: As of March 16, 2010 the Henbit are going strong, with the Purple Dead  Nettle just starting to emerge.   Looks like we are a week behnd last year in growth patterns.


Henbit: Lamium amplexicaule
Also known as: Multi-stories (mine), Giraffe Head, Llama head (mine).

Henbit is one of those things that never seems to go fully away. I have seen Henbit sprigs in the muck of a January winter, and they are one of the first blooms to announce themselves upon our lawns. Some folks call them weeds, but I have always thought of them as crushable flowers. (i.e. the kind we walk on, and discover to our great delight.)

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Henbit can be seen in great purple patches, and are often found in the presence of at least one thing which is not Henbit, Purple Dead-nettle (Red Dead-nettle) Lamium purpureum . Both Henbit and Purple-Dead Nettle produce a similar flower and are part of the Mint family. They often claim the same territory. When I first encountered the later I thought it to be an alternate season growth of the Henbit.



That which is not Henbit:




Purple Dead (or Red-Dead) Nettle.

(You can also see some in the big Henbit patch at top of page.)

Self Heal

Lyre leaf Sage

Snaptshot Week 9: 3/1-3/7 BIG BRADS

REPOST from last year, 3/1-3/7 2009


I am posting this again for a point of comparison.  We have just achieved this same state of full-balledness on the Bradford Pear this March 16, 2010 of this year.  So it looks like the clock of Spring is about one week to 10 days behind the bloom cycle of last year.



And this year the Japanese Mags are doing just fine!
a week behind.

Egg-on-a-stick, Bradford Pear

This week jettisoned us from the last (?) of winter to fully revved spring. Sunday and Monday morning (March 1 and 2) gave us temperatures in the twenties, which in turn deeply bruised the Japanese Magnolia, the trumpeters of Spring. By the end of the week we were pushing short sleeve shirts and 70 degrees.


Wounded Japanese Magnoia


The week was dominated by the presence of the Bradford Pear, which in the course of a week went from blossoming bones to full egg-son-a-stick flourish, and are -- as of end of week, starting to soften into pastel green. This week too, showcased the explosion of Red Maple, as they break into molten seed. To be honest, I had been puzzled by the identity of certain maples. No longer. The red maples announce themselves with great carmen force. Our sugar maples have yet to put out as much as a flower, but the blooming silver tips, mountain and beach maple types (see Maple page) tend to bloom then go to seed in muted tones of rust, straw, and olive. I also fully took in something I have seen, but not really cataloged. The maples appear to put on their spring garb in a pulse. First the maples build from colored tips to budding flower. As the flowers fade they also build into a stamen flourish. Then the stamens wither, and the whole tree appears to lose mass, going “backward” to an earlier winter look… then the withered floral parts explode in days, into large helicopter seed clumps.

Other activity at a glance:



Garden daffodils all over town
Forsythia and Japonica in full flourish, growing “green”
Cherry and Peach in light full flourish. (These appear to emerge just a few days after the Brads)
Elm trees, with heavy green mass (some of which may be floral)
Henbit, and that which is not henbit, in large patches.

As of yet unnamed ground and lawn flowers in thick patches. (See Lawn Dainties)

A yet unamed bush/shrub, with minature pear-like flowers and spikes woven in the wood.

(Unamed "snow" shrub, with pear-ish blooms and thorns)

First activity among the oaks, though a Huge Southern Red at the Capitol is leading the catkin pack. Fist showing of a Redbud tree. (Expect to see these break out next week

Many of the smaller White and Pin Oaks still with leaf.

"Roange" berry things continue leafless, and scattered along the highways.

"Rorange Berry"

Snapshot: Early March 2010

Beach - or Moutnain Maple toss red pom poms high.  As is, you  can identify maple right now - while driving 60mph -- just by looking for the red tinge scattered in the roadside wood-hedge.

These look a tad like Claytonia, but with only four petals and the bloom smaller than a paper punch, I think not.  Anyone have a guess.  They are super small and easy to miss.

 I guess I should figure out what these are, as they are one of those things that jump from the winter landscape. (I think the berries may be there in some form late fall, or even into mid Spring, but they don't seem to jolt the eyes unit the winter kill has left the world of all-other-color drained.

Daffodils bolt bold from the soggy cardboard sod.

March 7, 2010:    For whatever reasons, Spring seems to be on a slow-mo start this year, which may be all the better, given the clobbering certain early blooms took in the last three years. (Hard to imagine now, but just over two weeks ago, the ground was all monolithic white.) As is, I am deeply aware of a small handful of “indicators” – things I use to mark the sense of season. Three years ago, the Japanese Magnolia outside the Arkansas State Capitol Building opened abruptly in the first week of February -- only to be freeze-dried in a temperature dive just hours after bloom. They quickly turned a coffee brown. A year later (2007) they opened more or less in the first week of March, but then were coated by two freak snows, March 6 and March 9. Last year, the same blooms took off mid Feb to late March, but seemed locked in a slow-mo killing cold, and never just shouted. This year, as of March 6 the blooms have yet to crack skin and crest.

Seems too, that the daffodils and Maples are about a week or so behind.

As is, I found out last year that our major maples – the Silvertip and Sugar Maples flower later, but several other breeds (Red, Beach) are in now in full floral bloom. Look for a red mist hanging around the tips of trees littered in the woodlands. Chances are if you see rust or red up high, they are a maple.

Beyond that, the larger world is still pretty much the color of cardboard, with the first kelly tuffs – clover and henbit pushing thought the muck.

Snapshot, 2/8/10 - 2/10/10 Blanco

I have chased these rhythms with my lens
‘til I know now the basic parts:
A warming monolithic snow
dipping maple wood wet-black
and casting snowmen,
followed by the polyrhythm drip
and the ever catching earth.
 
(fragment, KSJ Incredible Math)
 
 
This is not a normal "ID Arkansas" post, as in - showcasing something to ID -- but this "Snapshot" reinforces for me just what a tight clock "Mother Nature" runs. I have pictures taken over several years that show major weather storms during this specific time in February. Last year, the 9th, it was a full on ICE assault culminating in one of the worst natural disasters in AR recorded history, the year before that we had back to back snow falls on the 6th and 9th. Only difference, that year Spring got a false start in January, which led to early blooming things (the Japanese Magnolia in particular) taking it on the chin. It would seem the Japanese Mags learned their lesson this year and are staying tightly tucked.

For some extra snow fun check out these Face Book Galleries

Snow One (Before 10AM on Monday Feb 8th)
Snow Two (After 10AM on Monday Feb 8th)
Invasion of the Frostoids  (February 9 and 10)

Snapshot: January 2010

Middle January

Today, January 25, the wind is brisk, sunny and filled with chill. A couple of weeks ago it was downright bitter, a couple of days ago short sleeve warm, and today... feeling just right for January. Last year at this time we seemed to be atypically warm, which was just wonderful till things stared blooming early only to be clobbered in a refreeze. And even thought the wind is cold, recent rains have primed the pump as our earth prepares for song.