Wildflowers in Colorado High Country

The Museum of Western Colorado sponsored its popular annual Wildflower Tour to the area near Crested Butte, Colorado over the past weekend.  A dozen of us traveled by van to take in a tour of Crested Butte, eat and shop in the quaint downtown area, and later attend an excellent evening chamber music concert of piano, violin and cello sponsored by the Crested Butte Music Festival.  Then we were off early Saturday morning to meet our wildflower guides and travel north through Gothic and the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory and on to find wildflowers.

We were at an elevation over 10,000 feet when our guides arrived at the areas where they had previously scouted out the best display of wildflowers.  We stayed on the gravel roadway (mostly) and were shown about three dozen different wildflowers growing close to the road where our guides pointed out unique characteristics of each of the flowers. Breathtaking views, magnificent flowers, and being taught by experts in their biological fields was memorable, to say the least.

I took about 100 photographs, then chose 50 of the better ones to put into a movie.  If you have a couple of minutes, the entire YouTube video can be seen below.  A few separate photographs are shown at the bottom of the post.

Crested Butte Mountain

Cow Parsnips

Elephantheads

Columbines

Although Colorado has had low rainfall this year, our guides kept a sharp lookout and found the following varieties of wildflowers to show the group: Tall Larkspur,  Sneezeweed, Longleaf Arnica, Bistort, Silvery Lupine, Parrot's Beak, Showy fleabane, Coulter's fleabane, Rosy Paintbrush, Sulphur Paintbrush, Daffodil Senecio, Tall Bluebells, Sawleaf Senecio, Cow Parsnips, Fireweed, White Geranium, Dock, Queen's Crown, King's Crown, Yarrow, Corydalis, Fringed Gentian, Star Gentian, Monkey Flower, Goldenrod, Shrubby Potentilia, Whipple's penstemon, Scarlet Paintbrush, Monkshood, Monument Plant, and Golden Aster.

On another note, I found an excellent app for the iPad called "Colorado Rocky Mountain Wildflowers" that can be seen here.  It can be accessed without using wi-fi; a great buy for $10 and good to use in the field.  They say, in part, ..."We have been careful to include the most abundant and visible plants and also those less common but found in unusual habitats, such as, wetlands, ponds, and rocky slopes. We have also chosen species from various altitudes, from 85 families and 200 genera, and from all geographic locations -- East Slope, West Slope, and the mountains between."

What a Wonderful World

David Attenborough and BBC presents:

Planting Weekend

Saturday was planting day over the weekend.  Home Depot and Walmart were the places I shopped, purchased and then planted:

Two dozen geraniums in pots

Perennial Sweet Flag grasses and three dozen small marigold plants

Assorted flowers that grow well in sun, like coreopsis

 (established ground cover)

Last, a dwarf Alberta spruce that did not seem dwarf upon planting:

Did you plant over the weekend?

The Husband's Weekend Work

Bark and a lot of it: 17 square yards that had to be spread out over the front and back areas between grass, shrubs and flower beds:

Before and after pictures with at least 1/4 of the bark still remaining after the work of the weekend.

And on a lighter note, the iris are blooming in our flower beds!

What's blooming in your yard?

(image from art in red wagons)

Green Man Forest Legend

That ubiquitous symbol of the Green Man is prevalent in European countries.  He is found on doorways and pub walls, in hotel entrances and outdoor venues, and of course, in the forest.  He comes in many forms and looks quite different each time you spot him.

(pinterest)

The Green Man

...is that spirit, energy, presence, inherent in every cell of the vegetative realm, and transmitted to the animal/human realms through the foods we eat, the flowers we smell, the trees we hug. He is Pan.

The Green Man I found online is cast iron and is weathering nicely on our back yard gate where he has kept company with the outdoor creatures for just over a year.  Here is our green man, guardian of the gate,  ready for a bit of artificial ivy to be twined around his head when the weather turns a bit warmer.

Yesterday I laid in a supply of green acrylics and will paint our garden shed door with a green man face so that he can keep the dogs company while they play outdoors.  This is a rough picture of the green man I'll paint on the shed bi-fold doors, starting today, hopefully:

Look for an update next week on the Green Man permanently residing on the outdoor shed.  Those acrylic paints last a long time.

Tiny Vignettes of Nature

All pictures are from The Pothole Gardner in London where he creates miniatures of natural delights.

Thank you, Steve, for bringing a smile to all the faces who view your exquisite work.

All pictures from The Pothole Gardner, a guerrilla gardener's blog

Wintering Geraniums

Last month, I brought in over a dozen fairly good sized geraniums to spend the winter in the garage.

Past failed attempts at keeping geraniums alive over previous winters included hanging the roots upside down (a definite failure), wintering the pots in the outside garden shed (they all died within two weeks), and then last year, they spent the winter in the house near a west window (some lived, but did not thrive) and in the garage (they actually lived and and even put on new leaves!).

An inexpensive shelving unit was purchased and assembled by the husband so that more pots could benefit from the sunny east facing garage.  He even cleaned up his work bench to allow room for the shelves.  And he hardly grumbled; that was probably just as sweet of him as assembling the shelves.

The plants are close to an east window in the garage, and seem to be doing fairly well after about six weeks in their winter home.  I've been watering them about every three weeks. Some lovely  geranium art pictures from Barbara's blog: Caroline Lord (American artist, 1860-1927) Woman with Geranium Aristide Maillol (French artist, 1861-1944) Portrait de Lucien 1896 Alfred Stevens (Belgian Painter, 1823-1906) Still Life with Geraniums 1889 Paul Cezanne (French artist, 1839-1906) The Flower Pots 1883-87 Nancy McCarroll, Oil

Pink Saturday

Beverly hosts Pink Saturday.  If you go here, you can see lots of pinks from bloggers who participate.

Here is my contribution, a double pink hollyhock:

Now that fall is here, the hollyhocks are a little worse for wear.  Those dang leaf hoppers have been getting to the leaves.  Believe it or not, just two days ago I found a leaf hopper and took his picture before he flew off to the cottonwood tree, never to be seen again.  This is his 15 minutes of fame:

Our Flowers in August

and finally, from pinterest: