Studio Plants.

A set of 8x8 acrylics on canvas, featuring the studio plants of yours, truly. (Streptocarpella, false bromeliad and wood hyacinth.)

Amaryllis

It was a slow, quiet night, and all throughout the house,
Gigantic, strange bulbs began putting out flowers!

And then there were seeds, too. Will see if I can grow one of these buggers.

Mild and newslike

The ground-pecker is out back again, looking mildly like a mourning dove on steroids. How such a bird can survive in our backwoods filled with cats and an occasional fox, gods only know.

The forced freesias are finally blooming, palest white and flame-red, respectively. The downstairs hibiscus (the one which we got from a friend for my folks, but were never able to part with), is slowly setting itself up with another show of blooms. The false shamrock at its base is flaunting dozens of flowering stems. Perhaps, the latter's got a complex about being short.

A couple of the African Violets, from the batch which survived the cyclamen mite epidemic of '11, are blooming as well. They are "Playful Rainbow" and "Optimara Clementine", both of which need re-potting badly. Of one of the three non-bloomers is the same plant that I strongly suspect started the epidemic, a living sign that heat treatment works.

The amaryllis decided that it wanted to bloom again and put out a pompous-looking bud, while the monster in the bedroom, AKA the passionfruit, is still struggling to take over the world.

Meanwhile, here I sit, typing things about all those plants, and eating slightly overcooked artichoke (make that two) for breakfast. Makes one feel slightly sacrilegious.

Winter's coming

Winter's in the air. You can feel it when you walk around in the evenings, it follows you in a shadow of smells. Rotting leaves, wood being burned in wood stoves and fireplaces. Titmice are stocking up on sunflower seeds.


I've made the first batch of pesto with all the basil that's been growing on the back patio, and it turned out well enough. The first batch of plants that've been outdoor all summer long are coming in, as well. They are taking over, slowly, but surely.





A seed-grown AV's been outperforming itself; however, the flowers aren't stick-tite, so chances are, 'll be getting rid of it in a flurry of last-minute Gardenweb trading-for-postage.







I wish there was more to say, but words fail me. Probably from disuse; silence on paper is viral.

Of living things and categorization.

Birds

Things have been happening! Things that started with “n”, and ended with “uthatches on our birdfeeder”! Humor aside, it’s been a thrill to see something other than mourning doves, cardinals, song sparrows, tufted titmice, and black-capped chickadees on that dastardly thing. Come spring, we might even get a finch or three on it.

Off-feeder, a pair of eastern towhees* was spotted digging tunnels to China at the base of the adjacent brush. Both song sparrows and towhees have this entertaining way of getting to food.. that is, hopping back and forth on one spot while digging into the ground/leaves with their claws. Dirt flies. Leaves and seeds do too, presumably. When there’s snow on the ground, song sparrows can make holes deep enough to almost completely submerge themselves.

An occasional blue jay would also land to graze under the birdfeeder with the mourning doves, but rarely stays long, and never ascends to the actual feeder. No sight of mockingbirds in the past week, but plenty of passing-by ravens.

(*Field guide to the birds of north America, by National Geographic, is what I use for identification. It has yet to fail me.)


Houseplants

Otherkitty’s been eating African violet flowers, which saddens me greatly. It’s not like there’s much protein in them. Spider plant bloomed with a single mildly exciting white flower, with more to come in the nearby future, if the buds surrounding the lonesome offshoot is anything to judge by.

A violet grown from leaf gotten in a plant trade back in Champaign (almost a year ago) is finally showing some buds. The girl told me that it’d flower white with purple edges, which, if true, would be awesome. The only AV around here that’s even close to white is a wine-colored chimera with faint pink stripes in the center of each leaf.


Hiking

Birds seen: ducks, crows, golden-crowned kinglets, cardinals, bluejays.

The mountainous wastelands of Virginia have been buffeted with snowstorm after snowstorm this winter, which made our usually daily hikes uncommon at the very least. We did manage to get out for three hours this past Sunday, which almost, but not quite, made up for it.

The first part of the trail is bordered by pastures, so getting a good look at some farm animals or even an occasional groundhog is a standard deal. This time around, a small herd of rather shaggy horses was grazing a short distance from one of the fences; two of these actually deigned to come up to the fence in response to a meager offering of dry grass. So, we got to scratch some horses behind the ears. Which isn’t earth-shatteringly exciting, but still is rather neat: one doesn’t get to be close to large, domesticated animals on a daily basis.

Having left the pastures behind, we then detoured off the main branch of Creeper Trail into a heart-wrenching climb which lead us up, sideways, and up again, zigzagging up a tree-covered slope, and occasionally sliding down on the outcroppings of gravel. El thought he was going to have a heart attack, then didn’t. On the way up, we’ve noticed a pair of tiny birds with golden-red spots on their heads, which were later identified as kinglets. These things were actually smaller than chickadees; barely the size of golf balls.

Eventually, we ended up at a place where a series of paths converged, and decided to go back, only to find a branching off of the trail which we haven’t noticed before. This branching lead to a marvelous little valley, filled with still-green plants (of what sort, I know not), and a number of sink holes.



Sink holes are just what they sound like, holes in the ground, dipping into some cave. The mountains are riddled with them in some places. A number of old trees with low-lying branches were scattered throughout the clearing, their limbs- coated in moss and lichen. The birds were rather prevalent as well, chittering in the trees, and likely glad to be out of the cold.

We stayed in this sanctuary for a good twenty minutes, before turning back. Sadly, I doubt we’d make it there during the summer, as the number of dry stems indicated that we’d have to tear our way through a veritable jungle of fireweed to make our way across.