There's more to spring beauty than meets the eye. A quick post about one of the most successful wildflowers.
The toughest in the land
Bounty’s beginning
The winner in the first to bloom race is hepatica! One of my favorite wildflowers captured in my own yard.
Elusive wildflowers – Part 16 – Clintonia
Bluebead lily is a common flower that I'm never on time for.
Fate and the Irony of Bloodroot
This post is going to be dual purpose. To showcase these beautiful flowers and to announce that this will probably be a short wildflower season for me here in NH. And probably the last for the foreseeable future. I'm moving out of New Hampshire. Out of New England too. Wisconsin. That's where I'm headed. Husband... Continue Reading →
Elusive Wildflowers – Part 13.2 – Pinesap
I found some!! I found some!! OMG! I barely know where to start this post other than to say that anyone witnessing me photographing these would have thought me crazy. It was almost an act of reverence. The fact that they were in a messy state and jammed up next to a pile of dead... Continue Reading →
Elusive wildflowers – Part 13.1 – Pinesap
It's the year for arriving late to the pinesap party. After years of looking for this unusual flower I found the mother lode in Weare, NH. OMG they were everywhere, but just past their full bloom stage. Darn it. You can bet I won't be late next year.
Elusive Wildflowers – Part 10 – Garden Loosestrife
Another one that's not elusive in the sense that it's rare, but that I've never encountered it before. This post combines my love of wildflowers and my yard macro thing from the last post. I spotted these guys in an overgrown garden that's being reclaimed by weeds. Sigh. Laziness. That's why I can't have anything... Continue Reading →
The Garden in the Woods II
In what I think it becoming an annual ritual, my mom and I went to The Garden in the Woods again in May. We don't go exactly on Mothers Day, but near to it and this year we went a couple of weeks earlier than last year and boy was it different. Most of the ferns... Continue Reading →
Looking out my front door
Lately I haven't had the time to shoot a lot. And sometimes when I have, it's just been too damn hot, humid or rainy. The desire is there, but the circumstances just won't work for me. That's why I love it when something great presents itself right outside my door. This time I mean that... Continue Reading →
The Garden in the Woods
If you live in New England or are here on vacation and you love wildflowers and wild plants in general, you owe yourself a trip to The Garden in the Woods, a preserve run by the New England Wildflower Society. It is magical, awe-inspiring and an unbelievably precious resource. My mom and I visited the... Continue Reading →
Me and my new GH3
As I said in my Elusive Wildflowers Part 9 post, I have a new camera. It's a Lumix (Panasonic) GH3. Yeah, I know they're hemorrhaging money these days, but the Lumix was the only one that would do what I want the way I want it. It's my first mirrorless camera and also my first non-Olympus.... Continue Reading →
Elusive Wildflowers – Part 9
So, two new things for you today. First being this gorgeous wild bleeding heart I found in my yard today. Never before have I seen or photographed the wild variety and so when I saw it today, I got right out there. I didn't use the E-30 though. Nope. New camera making its debut on... Continue Reading →
Autumnal Indian Pipe II
Woo hoo! Another fall-themed indian pipe shot. The brown stick phase of these little guys is so interesting, but I find it difficult to capture well. It's the texture and the funny shape the seed pods take that attracts me. Their dark coloring is a challenge, too; hard to light. I think I did ok... Continue Reading →
Piscataquog: Middle Branch
I'd been meaning to get back here since the first time I explored this little swatch of conservation land. It contains the middle branch of the Piscataquog river and has some interesting aspects to it like a pond and some defunct bridges. Unfortunately the light wasn't overly cooperative and when the sun came out I... Continue Reading →
Elusive Wildflowers Part 8 – Cardinal flower
Wahoo! Another beauty photographed. Never have I shot these before, but while out doing some river work (my favorite, the Piscataquog, and I'll post about that soon) I found some near a pond's runoff streams. This flower has become quite rare in some areas due to people picking and digging it up a lot. I... Continue Reading →
Elusive Wildflowers Part 7 – Horned Bladderwort
Another one that isn't so much elusive, as limited in photographic potential. It's limited in a few ways. First it lives in bogs and fens which are relatively rare habitats made rarer by man's manic need to fill in wetlands and build subdivisions on them. If you live in Indiana, Ohio, Tennessee or Illinois the... Continue Reading →
Elusive Wildflowers Part 6 – Wood Lily
Serendipity. Isn't that a great word? Almost as good as propinquity. But I digress. I say serendipity because a couple days ago I was thinking about wildflowers and how much I'd like to discover some wood lily in my travels. My parents had one growing in the front yard when I was a kid, and... Continue Reading →
Make Me Blush
The day of my epic face-plant yielded another present that I would have definitely missed had I gone home. All three of you that read this thing know that I had (have) a mini-project (obsession) going with Indian pipe flowers. I don't know what it is about these luminous beauties, but I am so drawn... Continue Reading →
Elusive Wildflowers Part 5 – Grass Pinks
Elusive in the sense that they require a specific and rare habitat, not that I don't have them nearby or that they are scarce in that location. I'm lucky. I live near a kettle bog (two actually, but one has more trail, luckily the closer one). A kettle bog, named for the shape of the... Continue Reading →
Gimme all your lupines!
Ah Monty Python, what a bunch of mad freaks you were. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, check this out - Part 2. You really have to like MP to find it funny, but I always think of it when anyone mentions lupines. And the other day when I shot some, I... Continue Reading →
Waterfalls and Wildflowers
Crazy, huh? Spring is so...springy. The two Ws are just irresistible - wildflowers and waterfalls. I've shot these particular falls before, but after a big storm knocked branches and whole trees down so the cascades were a mess. When I saw fellow photographer Jeff Newcomer's recent post about Garwin falls, I saw they were clear... Continue Reading →
Wildflower Roundup
As these are pretty common flowers (apart from the columbine, which I shot a few weeks ago) I'm not including them in the elusive category. Popular and ubiquitous or not though, I can't resist them. Wait!!! How did that last one get in there?? Heh.
Elusive Wildflowers Part 3 – Wild Columbine
Do you remember me stalking a plant that wasn't blooming and me not knowing what it was? Well today was my lucky day and I finally found it blooming. It's columbine! Yay!! Another one I'd never shot before. I don't remember even seeing it outside of books. Sa-weet. The light was really spectacular, but... Continue Reading →
Elusive Wildflowers Part 1.3 – Hepatica in bloom redux
"It looked like I had another chance at the twenty dollars." - Philip Marlowe, The Little Sister There's never a bad time for Raymond Chandler now is there? When I went to see if another flower was blooming, I found that the hepatica still were and this line from my favorite Chandler came into my... Continue Reading →
Elusive Wildflowers Part 2.1 – Bloodroot in bloom
I was right. It took two trips to get these in bloom. Somehow I'm not satisfied with my work, but for now it will do. The light went from terrific to flat in a short time and since it was still pretty breezy, I packed it in. Here's what I got though. Shot with a... Continue Reading →
