Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Wild flowers in the lawn

The frustrated wildflower photographer (me) roamed around the garden this weekend looking for flowers. There was nothing new in the woods, so I settled for what I could find in the less well-kept corners of the yard. You might think of these as weeds, but it's really a matter of perspective...

The bunnies were treated to their first dandy-lion adorned salads of the season!
A bunch or two of grape hyacinths pop up in random parts of the lawn every spring and remind me of my mother who had them planted in a little bed with lily-of-the-valley.


I'm not really certain what this is, but think it may be bittercress? It's blooming everywhere and must taste nice to someone.


The tiniest of yellow flowers, no bigger than the nail on my pinky finger, oxalis maybe, and nectar for a very tiny critter.


Purple violets, well before May Day, something else the bunnies like on their salads.

A couple years ago when my work schedule was flexible, I completed the classes and required volunteer hours to become a Master Gardener. If I remember correctly, I had to take 3 months of classes and *give back* 60 hours of volunteer work that first year. An awful lot of class time was spent learning things that I found pretty distasteful; mainly what sorts of herbicides would work to control broadleaf weeds like these in a manicured lawn. I've spent an even greater amount of hours pulling these weeds, and the summer weeds, and the fall weeds, and the winter weeds in the county parks where I do the majority of my volunteer hours these days.

The weeds always win. There's always more of them. Why not find a way to enjoy them?

9 comments:

KGMom said...

Oh Laura--how did you know. I just wrote a post today (in draft form) beginning with dandelions. I plan to publish it tomorrow, or the next day.
Hmmm--is there a wave length connection between central PA and coastal NJ?

DK & The Fluffies said...

WooHoo for Dandelions! ~Fiona Bun

Dr. Know said...

Well LauraHinNJ, you must live near the coast because your plants are well ahead of the inland areas. Cape May was one of my favorite places in NJ. Atlantic City was not. ;-)

Lots of blooms around here, but I haven't felt much like photographing them this year. Carpal Tunnel has drastically affected my computer time - but they look a lot like this, and this, and this. :-)

Noticed your comment and started to reply, but no email. Not quite sure what it meant but thanks for the percieved support. Living here amongst the evildoers is taking its toll.

RuthieJ said...

Dandelions and Violets - Yea! Both pretty flowers that grow in my backyard too. I let the dandelions all live because it's less expensive than killing them AND better for the environment (plus it will give me a chance to try making some dandelion flower jelly this spring!)
Master Gardener, eh? That's a LOT of work and volunteer hours. Good for you Laura.

Mary said...

I knew you must have studied flowers...you always recognize them and know their names!

Some weeds are very pretty, I agree.

RG said...

Yep .. especially if you live near the shore .. herbicides and too much fertilizer .. not good.

Love those Johnny-jump-ups!

LauraHinNJ said...

KGMom: There must be.

;-)

Diva Kitty: Yeah.. happy rabbits here.

Dr. Know: Yeah... Atlantic City is pretty creepy. Was there for a couple hours once.. enough to last me a lifetime, I think. I much prefer to see it from far away at the wildlife refuge across the water.

;-)

Thanks for those links to the garden posts on your blog. Nice! I'd think enough time spent in those surroundings would cancel out a fair amount the negative stuff.

RuthieJ: Dandelion jelly? Hmm. The bunnies wouldn't be happy if I were to pilfer too many of "their" flowers.

The Master Gardener thing is a fun way to get some formal training and it offers some great opportunities for volunteer work. Unfortunately, it's not well-suited to working people, so I end up mostly doing weeding on the weekends for all my *expert* knowledge. Pfft.

Mary: I make lots of things up, too. Shhhh..

;-)

Rabbit's Guy: Don't even get me going on the too much fertilizer bit. I have 5 rabbits and a Lab for goodness sakes!

;-)

MojoMan said...

This post reminds me how the herbicide and fertilizer industry declared clover (a wonderful little plant that fixes nitrogen from the air - for free!) a weed because their broad-leaf weed killers would kill it along with everything else, so consumers had to think of it as a weed.

No matter. As soon as energy prices are high enough, we will all be looking at all those manicured greenswards very differently.

dguzman said...

What a beautiful bunch of photos! You know how I love the tiny flowers. "weeds" indeed! These are the natural beauties that Nature gives us because she loves us.