The Beauty Of The Changing Seasons

[Lady Cannafan]

Okay, here's the whatizit's:

Two pairs of feet in a cotton cloud?

A misplaced Jellyfish?

Fruit of some kind?

And um...ahem...uh...I'll let you all decide what these are....

Another fruit? Hmmmmm...

 

[Lady Cannafan]

Thanks Grizz.

I'm using a Galaxy S5 Phone. The cameras in the new smart phones are awesome and getting better all the time with features and quality. I use it more than my regular digital camera for sure.

 

[GrizzWald]

Awesome... The footsteps look like they are meeting each other, beautiful..

 

[Radogast]

Second blooms on a Christmas Cactus?

 

[Lady Cannafan]

Hey Radogast, that was an understandable guess. It does look spiny on the leaves and such like a cactus, so I would probably have thought something along those lines too if I hadn't known what they are.

These are actually ground cover plants, that have gone a little too crazy covering ground. LOL I have to keep uprooting them from the lawn. They are called commonly "Spotted Dead Nettle", the scientific name is Lamium Maculatum.

The flowers are very small, less than a half inch, and they open into little bowls that hang downward.

The close ups you see in the pics are of the new flowers, they start out like little balls in white color and then turn to pink

Here's a pic of them when mostly mature:

And one so you can see the underside of the flowers:

This is where most of the whatizit's pics came from, the immature flowers. They are less than 1/4" in size:

The little feet are the stamens in the flowers.

I've got a really busy day ahead, and hoping the rain holds off for a while.

If I get anything picture worthy, I'll post later.

Happy Saturday all!

 

[SmokesDaKush]

Took some pictures this morning. Some tree flowers in bloom and some apple blossoms opening. A gloomy fresh morning rain! Enjoy the weekend!

 

[Lady Cannafan]

Stunning photos Smokey! I just love apple blossoms.
I've got some dogwood trees still surviving, despite the chemicals for weed control on the power line. Hope to get some pics today.
Raining pretty good right now.

Anyone in the path of the major storms south of us right now, please be safe!!

 

[Lady Cannafan]

I went for a walk and see that the one and only Lady Slipper left on the entire property is coming on strong. I used to have a lot of these, then the chemicals for weed control on the power line....
The only reason this one survived is because it's at the edge of my driveway near my front lawn. They couldn't spray in that area.
It grows in the same exact spot every year. Can't wait to get a pic when it's mature.

And I need to make a correction, the pic I posted of Easter lillies were not Easter lillies. This is a flower I have yet to be able to name, so when it blooms maybe you all can help me with that.

 

[SweetSue]

Wow Canna, how amazing that one Lady Slipper should survive for you. I love this thread! Subbed for the duration, which I'm hoping is years and years away.

I bet you liked those tulip pictures I took. Let me drop one here just to be neighborly. You should get flowers in celebration.

I couldn't resist, so I picked two.

It feels right to have you back Canna.

 

[Lady Cannafan]

HI Sue! Welcome to the thread. Such beautiful Tulips! That color is so cheerful...and somewhat calming at the same time. ;-) I'm just going to have to "steal" some tulips from Mom's house. LOL
Hope you have time to read back and enjoy.

I'll be posting some pics in the morning.

Have a great evening! (I've got some "swicking" to set up) ;-)

 

[SweetSue]

Okay, here's a couple pics and such.

I love to play with the color of the insides of flowers....as you've noticed. LOL

Reminiscent of Georgia O'Keeffe. Beautiful shot Canna.

Tomorrow I'll post pictures of the iris blooming on the property next to the nursing home holding my husband captive (not really, it just feels that way when they lock you in). I noticed this morning that they were about one morning away from bursting out all over. Love me some iris.

 

[Lady Cannafan]

Looking forward to that for sure Sue!

And glad to read that you are familiar with Georgia O'Keeffe. A lot of my flower shots have long been inspired by her paintings.
She had an incredible ability to look deep INTO flowers and capture them with her painting, rather than just looking AT them. That's just one of the things I admire about her.

Have a great night!

I'm off to bed now...really this time...for sure. LOL I HAVE to get off this computer today. ;-)

 

[Radogast]

Hey Radogast, that was an understandable guess. It does look spiny on the leaves and such like a cactus, so I would probably have thought something along those lines too if I hadn't known what they are.

These are actually ground cover plants, that have gone a little too crazy covering ground. LOL I have to keep uprooting them from the lawn. They are called commonly "Spotted Dead Nettle", the scientific name is Lamium Maculatum.

The flowers are very small, less than a half inch, and they open into little bowls that hang downward.

The close ups you see in the pics are of the new flowers, they start out like little balls in white color and then turn to pink

Here's a pic of them when mostly mature:

And one so you can see the underside of the flowers:

This is where most of the whatizit's pics came from, the immature flowers. They are less than 1/4" in size:

The little feet are the stamens in the flowers.

I've got a really busy day ahead, and hoping the rain holds off for a while.

If I get anything picture worthy, I'll post later.

Happy Saturday all!

The leaves are edible, and repotedly quite tasty...
Purely culinary and invasive, no medicinal effects.

 

[Radogast]

Took some pictures this morning. Some tree flowers in bloom and some apple blossoms opening. A gloomy fresh morning rain! Enjoy the weekend!

With our hard New England winter, the fruit tree, dogwood and magnolia blossoms have been spectacular!

 

[Radogast]

I went for a walk and see that the one and only Lady Slipper left on the entire property is coming on strong. I used to have a lot of these, then the chemicals for weed control on the power line....
The only reason this one survived is because it's at the edge of my driveway near my front lawn. They couldn't spray in that area.
It grows in the same exact spot every year. Can't wait to get a pic when it's mature.

And I need to make a correction, the pic I posted of Easter lillies were not Easter lillies. This is a flower I have yet to be able to name, so when it blooms maybe you all can help me with that.

I suspect those are Allium buds. When flower they form large purple dandelion style globes of flowers.

Does the plant look like an onion?

 

[Radogast]

Thanks Grizz.

I'm using a Galaxy S5 Phone. The cameras in the new smart phones are awesome and getting better all the time with features and quality. I use it more than my regular digital camera for sure.

I get nowhere near that quality with my Galaxy S5. I did better with my (lower resolution) Galaxy Note II. Is there a setting for close-ups??

 

[Radogast]

And just be cause I posted so many comments without photos .... an tulip photo from today.

 

[Lady Cannafan]

I'll be back on a little later for comments on last nights' posts. I wanted to post some pics from yesterday during my morning cuppa.

My grape vines are coming to life. I never really noticed before how the fresh leaves have so much beautiful color to them before they become just green. Here's a couple of them after the rain:

Some of the foliage around here just looks like sparkling diamonds after a rain to me. This was some unknown plant that I decided to get really close and then try to do a little artsy pic featuring the colors and raindrops.

The rain is Spain falls mainly on.......Well, it falls in Spain. DUH!
Here it falls wherever it likes. LOL
Another attempt at art, hopefully the close up looks like an oil painting:

It's raining hard this morning. Temp has cooled quite substantially, but it's still a great Mother's Day! And a happy one to all you Mom's!

 

[Lady Cannafan]

I suspect those are Allium buds. When flower they form large purple dandelion style globes of flowers.

Does the plant look like an onion?

You got it Radogast! Yes, a very very tall onion. LOL I first saw these many years ago outside a cemetery while driving by and thought they were so beautiful. I don't even know where I managed to finally find them and get them here, but they have done okay.
Problem where they are located is the danged feral cats and the rabbits keep short cutting through them and must actually lay down in there, they keep bending them and some even break.
I'm going to have to relocate them I'm thinking.
I believe I posted a pic of them last year after the blooms had turned to seed. I'll look through the pics today and see if I can find them.

On the phone camera question, the settings I make sure are on are the "tap to take pics", "picture stabilization", and I make sure "face detection" is off.
The setting for "Selective focus" is used sometimes, but I find that you have to be sure there is a fairly busy background or you will get a definite line showing in the photo where the focus starts and stops. Looks hideous. LOL

When getting close up, it may take some time to wait for the camera to focus on your subject and you may have to move the camera around a little bit to get there. That part of the camera can be frustrating, and I often have to back out of the camera program and go back in the get it to start over. I usually have to sit down or rubber band my phone to a monopod or something sturdy to avoid shake and jitters. Windy days are all but impossible to get really close up. Patience is needed for sure. LOL

After I get the pics, I upload to my computer and open them with Paint Shop Pro. That's where I do my cropping and enlarging/resizing to find the area of the pic I want to feature.

Hope that helps some.

 

[Lady Cannafan]

What a gorgeous Tulip Radogast...the color is so lovely and saturated!