Snapshot (Repost 3/30 from 3/22-3/29/09 Catkin Country

Water Oak, copper with floral catkin




Chestnut Oak, heavy with floral catkin

This almost last week of March was absolutley huge for Spring Time display. Only probem...It rained so hard and for so many days (in waves) that lots of the growth happened "unseen." If any week was flash week, this was it. Most of the Oak are in some form of flowering (thick in copper Catkin), with several species putting out new green to chase the gold. Beyond that, the maple are lumpy with seed and color.

Silver-tip Maple (green), and Red Maple (Red) burst forth in helicopter seed outcrop

Seedlings of a Red-Maple (?) variety

Highlights:

Water, Willow, Chestnut, Southern Red.... To be honest I am not sure of all of my Oak trees, pre-leaf - but I have seen all of these in bold flowering. (It seems the Pin Oak hold back, now naked and brittle)

Many of the Maples hit full seed. Even the Sugar Maple, latter than the others in flowering display are putting out some kind of odd display that I haven't figured out. Did I miss the flower (and they are going to seed) or is this the flower part, and the seeds follow late and behind the leaf. (see below)

Redbud - hit there full purple zenith early in week, some are starting to throw heart shaped tenders.

This is from 2009, and as has been the rule this season, we are about 7 days behidn last year's bloom cycle.  I have yet to see opening dogs, but they should be opening soon.


Dogwood started opening the begining of the week, and some are reaching full form by week's end (March 29)

Tulip Poplar, putting out leaf

Weeping Willow, cascading green

Little lawn flowers. Everywhere

Little violets - all over.

Three Leaf clover (standard white, still largley flowerless) but throwing out huge clover mounds.

Purple Dead-Nettle in large patches, appears to have eclipsed Henbit in volume.

Large bolts of onion grass.

Crimson clover emerging along our roadsides.

I hadn't seen them till someone mentioned them, but the yellow trumpet hedge floweres (Jessamine) are everywhere.

Tulips in full regalia.

Brads, now monolithic fresh green

Wisteria, in fall

Buttercups on the upwards swing

Snapshot Week 14: April 5-11

Water Oak in living green



Dogwoods barking loudly, some going to leaf.

"Rorange" berries. I have yet to learn the name of this plant, but berries are not new, they have been in place since deep winter.

Crimson clover boldly bound along Arkansas highways.

As of April 11, I now think of Spring in Central Arkansas as about half way done. The marker?--that triad of limon-green trees, and dogwood casting shadows on hot-pink azaleas.

Truth is, this was a schizophrenic week. The very best and worst of Spring, with chilly bright skies, tornadoes, freezing nights and open-door days. The week opened under vicious wind and closed with weeping skies. With heaven in between.

Heavy winds toss this emerging Willow Oak.
Willow Oak Catkin clump.

I hadn't really taken it in before this year, but the White Oak and Pin Oak appear later in the line of Oaks going into floral catkin flourish. And flourish they have, it great bulky mass. (I've noticed too, that I can now tell White Oaks from a distance, apart from a leaf. They are marked by a certain waviness to the branches.

White Oak covered in catkin.

The last of the new green is giving way to that wonderful "calico" green.... a splotchy blend of various green hues, from sage, to limon, to army, to the dark green of the pine, which will -- as the weeks unfold, darkened into a uni-mass. (Yellow patch = buttercups)

General observations:

Dog wood in full floral flourish, some going to leaf.
Redbud pretty much mopped up, with a few stragglers.
Limp dusty wisteria vines.
The Jesamine vines, with yellow flower seem thinner.
The byways are heavy under Crimson clover.
The hard branched Pin Oak softening with green.
Yellow "ragwort" on sticks, sticking out of pasture land
Purple "Blue Phlox" sprouting on roadsides.

Butter cups continue to thicken in pastures and in wet spots.
A lot more of the carnation bush for which I do not have a name -- in snowy bloom.

Snapshot Week 13: March 29 - April 5: Virid

Beyond the "Dogs" the big news this week was green - in every virid shade. (Virid = living pulsing green of a sort that doesn't seem to record with full force on film/or a digital plane. I have often thought of virid green to be the opposite but equal of blood-red corpuscles as viewed through a microscope. )




The new Sweetgum seedballs begin to mature. If I have it right, only one of the balls of the multi-ball cluster makes the descent, while the rest of the cluster falls to the ground. (See week 11)


Redbud purple dims as new green "hearts" push from the tips.

Not sure if this is new Walnut or Pecan growth (Mount Magazine view)

Still waiting on a better ID, but this catkin belongs to a member of the Birch family.



(File/04) Southern Red Oak goes to leaf, even as the catkins leave.

End of week, Southern Red Oak in full regalia (but still thickening)



Virid copper green Oaks near the State Capitol. These would be Willow Oaks, unless the leaf fattens up and I find they are Water Oaks. (There are some other very apparent Willow Oaks on ground that are not near as bunchy with leaf.


While the White oaks and Pin Oaks seem just now bursting forth in copper catkin (those floral chains that look like worms), many of the other oaks are shedding their "worms" as the new leaves push into flower, and spread them (with wind help) into dusty humps upon the ground.



I'm pretty sure these are the seeds of a Silver Tip maple, now turning brittle and the color of straw. Next week, whirling wind.




What a wild wisteria patch! I hope to return next year and harvest a body of images.




Other things observed:

Azalias (sp?), blooming under the dogwood.
Red bud greatly diminished
Red Clover building in mounds
Purple Vetch beginning to out from the Red Clover mix
Dock weed in the interstate
lots of the yellow stick (daisy family) flowers
White bushes coated in mini-carnation.

Red Maple given to bold green leafing
Silver tip Maple given to whirly seed browning, far less leaf than the Red.
Sugar Maple flowerettes strewn on the ground, a suggestion of whirly bird seed.