All around the Luck Cabin, there is mountain laurel bursting open, with clusters of white flowers. When they very first open they smell so sweet and good. Then the flowers slowly fall to the ground like white confetti, in a way so natural brides wish they could recreate such simple beauty down their wedding aisle, but could never compare.
I like it, alot.
XOXOxooxxox
What is it? This plant I found near my cabin is awesome! At least 5-6 ft. tall!!! One big flower grows on the end of the long stem....
The steman (dingies in the middle) pertrudes far out the center of the orange flower --- the petals are actually turning backwards away from the center, which makes it look more exotic.
The leaves go in perfect circles around the stem- and are long and thin. Each circle of leaves is about 5 inches apart, and towards the top they spread out into one here and there.
Is this plant native to Western North Carolina? Can anyone help me figure out what this plant's name is???
Xoxoxox
Hey ya'll! You are so good at helping me identify plants & trees I don't know, I thought I'd ask my special detective readers to help me out again!
It's leaves are hanging down (may be because spring is still in it's early chilly stages here) - but each flower comes from a thick watery stem (resembling the stem of a blood root) and one set of the three leaves on a separate stem.
Pictured below, it is growing underneath a large violet colored trillium. These striped beauties are growing in a group together, in a shady area. I have this vague memory from back 7 years ago when I lived in Bethel, NC that a woman who loved native plants showed me one of these and called it Jack In The Pulpit?
xoxoxo
I found another trillium species at my house!!!
Xoxoxo
Don't they look like happy little dragons? Or maybe a dancer twirling her skirt?
I found ones with white flowers and ones with violet/maroon colored flowers! Have ya'll seen these bloom yet at ya house?
PS- If you are local to Western North Carolina, there is an herb festival every year in Asheville, NC that sells all sorts of native plants for your garden, including the trillium pictured here!
Guess what I discovered today! I was in my garden and I pulled a few marigold petals off the flower and rubbed it hard against some cardboard...voila, it made an orange mark! Then I got some dark orange/red colored nasturtiums, more orange marigolds, and golden rod (yellow) flowers and decided to try and draw with them.
I started with the golden rod yellow flowers for an outline of the drawing since they have the lightest pigment. When drawing with solid colors it's best to build the pigments up from lightest to darkest.
The marigolds gave a full on orange, bright and full of pigment, the golden rod was a lemon true yellow and the nasturtiums came out strangely reddish mauve.
I got really excited that I remembered there was CHARCOAL in the wood stove from last time wood burned. Funny how in art school it never dawned on me the charcoal was simply from wood, since all our art supplies were bought in stores rather then handmade. When I moved out into the woods and burned wood in a stove for the first time, a piece of charcoal fell out onto the floor and I stepped on it and slide across white tile, making a huge line across the floor. I was like OH My GAWd, this is charcoal!!! :)
Adding the blackness of charcoal to any drawing, any color makes everything very bold and intense. I am also not really one for subtle art though too.
This was a eco art quickie, that took less then 5 minutes for me to draw, but shows that there is a range of stuff we can make without relying on an art store, without spending money and without harming the earth in order to create good art. We don't need to be starving artists cause we've spent all our money on art supplies or because our art supplies are so toxic it's polluting soil and water.
XoXoXoooooo
Seeds I was meaning to harvest and save for next year are growing right on the plant! These are marigold seeds growing right out the pouch that holds them, because of the massive amount of moisture and rain we've had for the last few weeks. You can see in the pic below the bottoms of the seeds are all forming roots - pretty wacky!
This is a whole new weird weather happening I never thought of- if the plants going to seed start sprouting on the vine (as did many of the beans too) because of unusual amounts of rain then it's difficult to save seeds for the next season.
XoXOooo
Now that is freakin' tall. It's the leaning tower of sunflower!
Nature is at it's summer peak, where everything is almost as big and tall as it's gonna get - animals have been pretty well fed, and things are relatively peaceful and quiet. The first thing I saw at the beginning of this trail was an Eastern Box Turtle closed up in it's shell! Cool! This particular spot is usually an active nook near some large rocks, where there's been a bobcat track, possible bobcat sighting, chipmunks, animals trails and dead animal smells. The turtle has the best armor and could tell all was pretty calm for it's afternoon stroll.
Walking along there are patches that make be feel downright tarzan, it gets wild with giant grape vines, hardy jewel weed, and poison ivy climbing high up into the tops of trees. (I have lucked out, cause of all the stupid things I am allergic to, poison ivy is not one of them! yippee!)
The overgrowth of tiny micro mushrooms here is so magical, it's straight out of a fairytale. They spread out all over the ground, on the trail, and then climb up the dead tree stump. Mushrooms love dead trees. :)
There's a barbed wire fence along part of the trail that separates the property from a cow field. I have to admit I have jumped this fence a few times just to look at the flowers and trees on the other side - hoping there was no bull in the area. Everytime was totally worth it.
On my way back home I saw this new animal hole dug under a huge rock - seems like a good place to live. Makes me wish I was (more of) an animal.
XoXo
Little Shop Of Horrors anyone? Jimson weed (also known as Thorn-Apple) is the kind of plant that has so many nuances it becomes legend in your garden or field. Let's start with this...it's a nightshade- a smelly, stinky weed so bad when you pick it, it leaves your hand smelling like poisoned meat nutty hell fire. It's nasty funk scent isn't just confined to it's stem and leaves, according to old farmers here if you plant your squash next to it the poor squash comes out tasting like Jimson Weed! Woo gross. But it gets even more curious then that...
Jimson Weed is considered a "virulent narcotic poison". Dat's some big words that mean this plant is a toxin that can be easily overdosed. The reason people overdose on this smelly ass plant is because it can also make a person hallucinate, with a little vertigo & nausea & delirium & possible death thrown in the mix for good measure. The Navajo Indians described ingesting Jimson like this "Eat a little, and go to sleep. Eat some more, and have a dream. Eat some more, and don't wake up" - creepy, the not waking up part is usually right after the seizures and coma. And best check it before ya wreck it, cause Jimson Weed is also an illegal drug in the USA- on that note there is all kinds of wacky info on the internet about taking it as a herbal medicine for various health probs such as asthma. Hmmm.
Sometimes it feels like colors have their own season. Like everything yellow blooms, then everything purple, then everything white. It's white time in the woods right now... these are pictures of white wild flowers & one marshmellowy mushroom growing along the trail. I saw the white tail of a deer too, after following it's tracks but it ran away fast and hard.
