Tag: Plants

Flowers from a friend

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In exchange for some pears my friend gave me some flowers. I thought how kind, I wasn’t expecting anything back. The roses are a mellow red colour, and there are pale purple Fushias and white roses and some different white flowers.

Apparently the Victorians used to give different meanings to different plants. For instance Forget-me-nots. I think also Pansies and Lily of the Valley. I don’t know the meanings, but I know people used to press flowers within the pages of heavy books. Or even flower presses. The idea was to squash the flower so it became dried and flattened. If the person pressing it was artistic it could be used in artwork, some of them would be used for illustration purposes. I’m not sure how they would have coped with larger flowers like multi petal led or stemmed flowers. I guess they would have needed more steady pressure? Sorry, a lot of this is speculation. My mind wanders across different thoughts….

Bee photo?

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Bee?

I don’t know what species it is, I can’t get very good closeups with my phone but I think it’s a Bee, however it could be a hover fly? The back end of it doesn’t look fuzzy enough. But it has yellow and black bands on it. So does anyone know?

Whether bee or fly, at least its something that pollinates plants, and that’s what we need to protect in the world. Imagine a world without pollinating insects? There would be a lot less fruit and vegetables unless we were to hand pollinate or create machines that could do it. But we don’t need that. We need to protect what we already have! Banning pesticides that kill bees, like nicotioides. Farming responsibly and safely. Its a difficult balance. But we must make it happen.

From thirty years ago?

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From an old slide

Finding things that I haven’t seen for years. There is a set of old slides that I might try and get turned into photos. I’ve also seen an app where you can convert negatives to photos on your phone, which is great, but I already have them in albums and do I need more on my devices? I wish I still had the painting but it was sold to the local MP at the time. I think it ended up at the house of commons!

This was a friend years ago. I painted it with the idea that the perspective of the window gave it an interesting effect. The figure looks large in comparison to the shelves across the window. I also liked the slightly twisted pose. It’s an oil on canvas.

Six years ago…

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Bright flowers, photo taken six years ago. I think it’s a rhododendron, glowing like an orange sun. Talk about flower power. I’m not going to try and duplicate or mirror this photo because it’s really stand alone.

This would have been taken at the Dorothy Clive Garden on the Shropshire, Staffordshire, Cheshire border. It has a quarry garden at the top of its slope which is full of beautiful rhododendrons in late spring and early summer. Do visit if you can. Visiting has been limited due to the virus but I do know they are open and you can find out more from their website.

Flowers

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Used layout app to create this image of pink busy lizzies and a metal plant support. I just have fun playing with images. The pink and green are nicely contrasting colours, the smooth surface of the plant support adds more interest. The symmetry of the mirrored leaves and stems complete impossible and intricate patterns. They are natural and unnatural in equal amounts.

Pears

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Views of the pear tree. They are getting bigger and a small branch has broken off. The sun was out again today although the wind is coming from the north and cooling things down. My hanging baskets have just started to wilt a bit since we hot this dry spell. I’m watering them, but the coll nights and the big gaps in the new fence are making the yard a bit cooler. The time will come when everything dies back. I’m pleased though that I’ve found a small courgette on one of my plants!

Two old codgers

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Hubby and I, helping in the local allotment. We are helping a community project clear a couple of old allotments of weeds so they can be used for growing produce. It is slow going to get rid of so many weeds. We are trying to take out the cooch grass and convolvulus (bind weed). However we are leaving some flowers like poppies in situ. I wasn’t feeling well today so I only managed a bit of work. Its going to take a while to get on top of it. Hopefully by next spring it will be planted up and ready for a good summer of growth. One thing that is already there are apple trees with masses of apples on them. We were allowed to take a few home with us.

Apple tree

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In my friends garden

This is a thirty eight year old apple tree that he planted in his garden. It’s huge!

The limbs are massive

It has been a very fruitful year for some fruit trees.

I was amazed, the tree is covered in huge cooking apples. My friend said he weighed one of the large ones and it was over 900 grams. It was a fantastic visit. Seeing someone else’s produce. He also has a small pear tree that is covered in conference pears.

He also has tomatoes which I’m jealous of because I didn’t get any this year!