A few days ago when the weather was fine, Todd and I wandered over to Halls Creek Wood Preserve. It’s located about five miles from our house, not too far from the city of Morrow. The park covers 238 acres and has two miles of trail. Halls Creek and the Little Miami River meet in the preserve and offer beautiful water views. We saw several interesting trees and enjoyed the art show that they had prepared for us. While we didn’t see any of the parks animal inhabitants, we caught glimpses of their presence. Over the next few articles, I’ll share with you the beautiful sights and sounds of the Preserve. So, put your hiking boots on, grab your jacket and come away with us.
Category: PicPosts- great photographs
Echinaceas are one of those plants that I cannot resist taking a photo of, whether they are in bud, in full flower, gradually dying, or in their seed head stage. I photograph them in every season whatever the weather. But first a look into my sketchpad.
And here is a gallery of some of my attempts. I try to capture their various shapes, colours, textures and catch their every mood.
The photos were taken throughout the seasons from summer to winter and I hope illustrate their changing shapes and colours.
I have at last got a link to my Flickr photostream so if you want to see what is on there so far please click on link in right margin of my posts.
Want to find out more about snowdrops? see my post about them under ‘Plantax’
Wisley Apples
First off, thanks to Tamara and all the readers of My Botanical Garden who have been visiting and posting comments. It has been a pleasure being able to cross pollinating between blogs and to hear from some new readers! Today – the last installment in the three-part series on the vegetation of Tierra del Fuego.
Darwin’s diary remains quiet today, but in the January/February section of this Zoological Notebook he has quite a bit to say about the dominant vegetation of the other major ecosystem of southwestern Tierra del Fuego – the Magellanic moorlands (I love that name – I think it is my new favorite place).
Again, let me turn the floor over to Darwin to set the stage:
“In every part of the country which I have seen, the land is covered by a thick bed of peat.— It is universal in the mountains, above the limits [of]…
View original post 1,062 more words
The Pena National Palace (Palácio Nacional da Pena) is a Romanticist palace in Sintra, Portugal. The palace stands on the top of a hill above the town of Sintra, and on a clear day it can be easily seen from Lisbon. It is a national monument and constitutes one of the major expressions of 19th century Romanticism in the world. The palace is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the ‘Seven Wonders of Portugal’.
Pena Palace Park is a vast forested area completely surrounding the Pena Palace, spreading for over 200 hectares of uneven terrain. The park was created at the same time as the palace by King Ferdinand II, who was assisted in the task by the Baron von Eschwege and the Baron von Kessler. The exotic taste of the Romanticism was applied to the park as it was to the palace. The king ordered trees from diverse, distant lands to be planted there. Those included North American Sequoia, Lawson’s cypress, Magnolia, and Western Red Cedar, Chinese Ginkgo, Japanese Cryptomeria and a wide variety of ferns and tree ferns from Australia and New Zealand, concentrated in the Queen’s Fern Garden (Feteira da Rainha). The park has a labyrinthine system of paths and narrow roads, connecting the palace to the many points of interest throughout the park, as well as to its two gated exits.
Source: Wikipedia
Old School Garden 