Cathy and Daffodils

Photograph taken on Sunday, March 31, 2019 by Henry
Cathy and Daffodils

Cathy and Daffodils

After church this week, for the third week in a row, we walked over to the Stadtman Preserve to see the bulbs. The daffodils are pretty spectacular and entire sections of hillside are yellow with them. The Chionodoxa is still in bloom and there are areas completely dotted with their pretty, blue flowers. I took pictures of Cathy in a few different spots but I had only brought one lens, the 100mm, which wasn’t really idea for that sort of portraiture. This one turned out pretty well, though. Spring it definitely here and we’re loving it.

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Chionodoxa forbesii

Photograph taken on Saturday, March 30, 2019 by Henry
Chionodoxa forbesii

Chionodoxa forbesii

I try not to repeat subject too often and too close together but sometimes I just have to. The Sunday before last I posted a pictures of three Chionodoxa forbesii (glory of the snow) blossoms, taken at the Stadtman Preserve on Mill Run, in Derwood (see Sunday, March 17, 2019). Two weeks later they are out in our garden and I couldn’t resist another picture. This little clump of flowers is at the south end of our house and it’s so lovely. I promise, I’m done with this flower for the year (although there’s a pink variety in another part of our garden).

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Cherry Blossoms

Photograph taken on Friday, March 29, 2019 by Henry
Cherry Blossoms

Cherry Blossoms

I had some car trouble today. My van, which has just over 269,000 miles on it, started making a terrible grinding noise when I put on the breaks. I thought, I don’t care, bad breaks aren’t going to stop me! But seriously, there are car repairs you can put off and car repairs you can’t put off. Brakes are in the latter category. After having Cathy meet me at the mechanic’s we stopped at the commuter parking lot near the ICC and I took some pictures of the cherry blossoms.

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Sunset

Photograph taken on Thursday, March 28, 2019 by Henry
Sunset

Sunset

The sky had the promise of a really spectacular sunset this evening but sadly it didn’t follow through. It wasn’t a bad sunset, mind you, but it wasn’t as fabulous as I had hoped. The clouds were moving fast and it was changing from minute to minute. As you can see in the lower part of this picture, between the houses, the best part of the sunset was too low to be seen from our back yard. Still, it was a worth a few minutes of my time and the ground wasn’t so cold that I couldn’t be out in my bare feet for a little while.

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Rockville Cemetery

Photograph taken on Wednesday, March 27, 2019 by Henry
Rockville Cemetery

Rockville Cemetery

I stopped at Rockville Cemetery on the way home today. With the weather turning warmer (relatively) and the sun out, it’s very tempting to be outdoors as much as possible. My job, of course, keeps me inside most of the time and it’s been fairly busy lately, with lots of revisions and bug fixes. That’s meant that I haven’t been out during the day too often. With the time change it’s light later in the day and that gives me more of a chance to get out after work.

Rockville Cemetery, on Old Baltimore Road, is a nice, relatively quiet place. The eponym of my high school alma mater is buried there. The graves of Walter Johnson and his wife Hazel are in a very shady spot under a pair of mature spruce trees. Generally it’s hard to get a good picture of them because it’s so shady but when I was there today the sun was slanting under the trees’ lower branches and lighting up the grave markers. This photo is from another part of the cemetery, though. I really love big, old, white oaks (Quercus alba) and this is a nice specimen.

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Turkey Vulture (Cathartes aura)

Photograph taken on Tuesday, March 26, 2019 by Henry
Turkey Vulture (Cathartes aura)

Turkey Vulture (Cathartes aura)

I stopped at the park on the east side of Lake Needwood this afternoon. It was a beautiful, warm day, although not as warm as it’s been. I heard and then saw a few turkey vultures (Cathartes aura) a short walk from where I stopped and I headed in their direction. They had moved up into the trees by the time I got close but I also happened to see two red tailed hawks (Buteo jamaicensis) as I walked nearer. I got a few pictures of them but they were taken through the branches and didn’t turn out all that well. I got a nice picture of this turkey vulture with its wings outspread, but that picture, too, had branches in the way. This one, of the vulture as he took off from his perch on the tree stump is my favorite. The next frame, taken a fraction of a second later, is actually better of the bird, but he’s just starting to go behind another tree trunk, which sort of ruins the effect.

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Embroidered Robe

Photograph taken on Monday, March 25, 2019 by Henry
Embroidered Robe

Embroidered Robe

On Saturday we stopped at the storage locker and brought some things home to go through. That included a clothes rack and one of the items on that rack was a large, hooded robe all covered with embroidery. This photo is a part of that embroidery. Neither Cathy nor her mom know where it’s from but probably Cathy’s dad bought it somewhere. It’s in pretty new condition but it’s too long for either Cathy or her mom to wear (and not really their style, in any case). The embroidery is pretty, with flowers and plants in orange, yellow, and pale green.

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Windflower (Anemone blanda)

Photograph taken on Sunday, March 24, 2019 by Henry
Windflower (Anemone blanda)

Windflower (Anemone blanda)

Last Sunday after church we walked to the Stadtman Preserve and I posted a picture of three little Chionodoxa forbesii blossoms. This week we went there again. The daffodils are starting to bloom and there are lots more Chionodoxa flowers opening up throughout the property. It was this little windflower (Anemone blanda) that really caught my eye. It’s such a pretty little thing. I’ve had a few of them in our garden but they never really amounted to much. I need to make a note to myself to buy a bunch of them and put them in. Interestingly, the flower is apetalous (it has no petals) and what look like petals are actually sepals.

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Forsythia Buds

Photograph taken on Saturday, March 23, 2019 by Henry
Forsythia Buds

Forsythia Buds

The forsythia is starting to bud. As I write this, a week after the photo was taken, the buds have opened and the flowers are out. Spring can move quickly at times and when we have a warm spell, as we do at some point most years, buds open quickly. We often then have a frost that can kill back some of the more tender plants a bit. The early flowering star magnolia, with its fleshy, succulent petals, is generally one of the hardest hit. Other plants, like most early bulbs, the Lenten rose, and the forsythia, are better able to cope with a little cold, and generally just stop briefly, only to continue once it warms back up.

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Rain on My Office Window

Photograph taken on Friday, March 22, 2019 by Henry
Rain on My Office Window

Rain on My Office Window

Yesterday we had almost 2 inches of rain but it was sunny this morning. Then, a little before 4:00 PM, it got very dark and we had a serious downpour. The storm raged for about 15 minutes and then withing a half an hour the sky was clear and solid blue again. I took this picture towards the end of the rain, focusing on the water on my office window, looking out towards the big trees on the edge of the parking lot. I was glad not to have been caught out in it. It really came down hard. The forecast for the weekend is nice, however. We can still have some cold and even the possibility of snow, but spring it definitely upon us.

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Old Phone

Photograph taken on Thursday, March 21, 2019 by Henry
Old Telephone

Old Telephone

I’m not going to pretend that most of my followers have never seen one of these before, because it hasn’t actually been that long since there were rotary phones in every house. In the 1960s, mom took Ralph and me to the New York World’s Fair and we got to time ourselves dialing our home phone number on both a rotary dial phone and a touch tone phone. Needless to say, the difference was pretty significant. I remember how you hated having to dial numbers with a lot of 9s or 0s in them. We also talked to each other from different booths on a video phone. That took a little longer to pan out, but now, that’s here, as well. The phone pictured here is probably from the 1950s or possibly the 40s. On the other hand, I suspect it still works.

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Lenten Rose ‘Rose Quartz’

Photograph taken on Wednesday, March 20, 2019 by Henry
Lenten Rose ‘Rose Quartz’

Lenten Rose ‘Rose Quartz’

I hope you won’t mind one more Hellebore. This one is called ‘Rose Quartz’ and like the crocus pictured yesterday, it is in the bed out back with lily of the valley and Vinca minor. This is only its second year blooming and while there are more flowers this year, it’s still not a huge, robust plant yet. Lenten rose is a long-lived perennial and although they take a while to get established, they take very little care and are quite sturdy. The Latin name for the genus, Helleborus, comes from the Greek helein (ἑλεῖν), meaning “to injure”, and bora (βορά), meaning “food” because the leaves, stems, and roots are poisonous to humans.

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Crocus

Photograph taken on Tuesday, March 19, 2019 by Henry
Crocus

Crocus

The so-called Dutch crocus (Crocus vernus and its cultivars) is native to the mountains of Europe, the Pyrenees, Alps and Carpathians. The name crocus comes from krokos (κρόκος) the ancient Greek name for saffron (Crocus sativus). While crocuses prefer gritty, well-drained soils they do amazingly well in our heavy, clay soil that is totally water logged all winter most years. This one is growing in a bed of lily of the valley (Convallaria majalis) and Vinca minor in our back yard. There are also some daffodils and hyacinths that are starting to come up bu those won’t be in bloom for a little while yet.

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Helleborus ‘Red Racer’

Photograph taken on Monday, March 18, 2019 by Henry
Helleborus ‘Red Racer’

Helleborus ‘Red Racer’

This is, I think, my new favorite Lenten rose. I have two of them, bought from McClure and Zimmerman in the fall of 2014 but this is the first year the blooms have been what I might describe as fully formed. They are a variety called Red Racer but they don’t seem to be listed on the mzbulb web site any longer. Other outlets seem to have them, though. I really love flowers (and leaves) of this sort of color, especially when back lit. These aren’t in the best location it terms of the sun shining on them from behind, but it was just filtering through the shrubbery behind them this evening.

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Chionodoxa forbesii

Photograph taken on Sunday, March 17, 2019 by Henry
Chionodoxa forbesii (Glory of the Snow)

Chionodoxa forbesii (Glory of the Snow)

After church we walked over to the Stadtman Preserve, where hundreds of daffodils are coming up and a few blooming. There were also huge drifts of winter aconite (Eranthis hyemalis) although they were almost entirely past their bloom. There were also a very few of these Chionodoxa forbesii flowers. With the common name glory of the snow, it’s no surprise that they bloom early and they are definitely one of my favorite flowers, especially among the spring ephemerals. It is native to western Turkey and is hardy as far north as USDA zone 3. Those growing in my garden are considerably behind, but I’m looking forward to having them bloom in a few weeks.

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Silas

Photograph taken on Saturday, March 16, 2019 by Henry
Silas

Silas

Cathy and I helped Seth and Iris move this morning. Their new apartment is very nice and their shorter commute will be a real blessing for them, I suspect. I’ve said at times that I’m getting too old to help people move but this is family and anyway, they don’t have a huge amount of stuff. One small truck load of furniture and two van loads of other stuff and we were done. The carpeting on the floor will be nice for Silas as he continues learning to crawl and the apartment will be easier to baby-proof than where they were. Silas was really good throughout the whole process although I wonder if he understands enough to wonder what was going on. I’m sure you won’t be surprised to learn that I took quite a few pictures of him. I’m really pleased with a few of them, including this one. What a cute kid.

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Winter Aconite (Eranthis hyemalis)

Photograph taken on Friday, March 15, 2019 by Henry
Winter Aconite (Eranthis hyemalis)

Winter Aconite (Eranthis hyemalis)

As mentioned a few days ago, the winter aconite (Eranthis hyemalis) is coming into bloom. It’s a very hardy little plant, growing from a small, sort of misshapen tuber, native to the northern Mediterranean coast from southern France, across northern Italy, and down the eastern coast of the Adriatic and east to the western shores of the Black Sea. It’s very slow growing and the few that survived from my initial planting are only still only producing a handful of flowers. I should probably plant more, but last year was mostly a write-off in terms of gardening. We’re hoping to do quite a bit more this year.

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Moss

Photograph taken on Thursday, March 14, 2019 by Henry
Moss

Moss

It was a beautiful day today and I needed to get out of my office for a few minutes to clear my head. I’ve been working on two specific problems with one of the systems I’m working on. I’m pretty sure I managed to get one of them solved and settled. The other is proving to be a little trickier but I’ve managed to get it pretty close to working. Sometimes it’s useful to step away for a little bit and think about something else. Then when you come back, you can see it with somewhat fresher eyes. I find that I often come up with new ideas at that point. This is true in other realms than programming. When I’m working on a crossword puzzle and get about as much done as I can manage, putting it down and walking away and then picking it up later is generally all I need to find some new answers. Today’s foray out into the woods let me to a bunch of moss, and that’s what today’s photo features.

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Camel Pendant

Photograph taken on Wednesday, March 13, 2019 by Henry
Camel Pendant

Camel Pendant

There was a lot of stuff in Cathy’s mom’s house, including a surprising number of things that Cathy had never seen. The jaguar skin that I posted a picture of recently was one example. This gold pendant in the shape of a camel is another. Specifically, this is a dromedary, the one-humped camel (Camelus dromedarius), currently existing only as a domestic or feral animal, having been first domesticated in Somalia or the Arabian Peninsula about 4,000 years ago. There are two species of two-humped camels, the Bactrian camel (Camelus bactrianus) and the wild Bactrian camel (Camelus ferus), which until recently was assumed to have descended from feral domesticated Bactrian camels. Genetic studies have shown it to be a separate species.

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Andrew and Rachel

Photograph taken on Tuesday, March 12, 2019 by Henry
Andrew and Rachel

Andrew and Rachel

As I mentioned on the picture of Dorothy lounging in the snow the other day (see Saturday, March 09, 2019), Dorothy is here with some friends. These are two of them and they are engaged (to each other). Andrew and Dorothy enjoy playing music together as the group Kinsman. Rachel is a fellow art student with Dorothy. We have met them both a time or two but didn’t really get to know them at all until this week. I see why Dorothy likes them both, individually and as a couple. Getting a good picture of them has been a challenge, in part because they aren’t crazy about having their picture taken.

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