Monday forest photo: May 30, 2011

3:30pm 27C sunny

Well, summer's here. After weeks of cool, rainy weather, we woke up today to sun and warmth and a forecast for lots more of both. It's quite a relief. In the woods, everything is GREEN and lush and smells like flowers. I'm kind of embarrassed that the only blogging I've done this month are the forest photos, and I will try to do better for June. Of course, now that the fine weather is here, I'm sure I'll find lots of other things to do. I am always amazed at just how much effect the weather has on my mood and energy level. I'm feeling quite revitalized today.

Monday forest photo: May 24, 2011

9:00am 20C cloudy

 No, I didn't get raptured or even hauled off by a swarm of mosquitoes. My camera was galivanting around Toronto yesterday, so not available for a Monday forest photo. I think this week looks like last week, except someone took a crayon and added more green.

There are lots of violets everywhere, even some yellow ones.

There's a patch of wild columbine with these beautiful ornate flowers.

I think this is what is called wild lily-of-the-valley. I was a lot more sure of that before I tried to identify the next one, which I think is star flowered Solomon's seal, also known as wild lily-of-the-valley. I guess this is the limitation of using common names.

Monday forest photo: May 16, 2011

9:45am 5C rain

Someone flipped the green switch on the forest this week, but they turned the heat down and left the water running. Just when things were starting to dry out the rain has started again. I'm going to bed with the covers pulled over my head until the sun comes out.

Monday forest photo: May 9, 2011

9:00am 12C sunny

After a cold, rainy week this sunny mild weather is most welcome. Everything is greening up, though no proper leaves on anything yet. Around here, this kind of spring weather is often quite brief as summer can arrive any time now.

There are lots of trilliums in bloom now, though we don't have carpets of them. We also don't have swarms of blackflies or mosquitoes yet.

Monday forest photo: May 2, 2011

11:00am 12C rain

Another rainy day. The leaf buds on the trees are getting huge and I expect that next week's picture will be noticeably greener than this one. With the warmer temperatures, there's lots going on if you look closer up. 

The sight of a trillium bud is enough to warm the heart of a native-born Ontarian, as it is the provincial flower and we spent our elementary school years being told how special and delicate this plant is. I wouldn't dare pick one for fear of wiping out the entire species. I guess the message got through.

The trout lily (Erythronium americanum) was in bloom this week. Some pollinating insects were taking advantage.

We saw a group of Yellow Rumped Warblers in the woods on the weekend. We had a great view of them since the leaves aren't out yet and they aren't at all shy.

I've seen quite a few snakes already this spring, Garter snakes and Eastern Smooth Green snakes. This was a tiny little green snake looking for a patch of sun with no humans in it.

Monday forest photo: April 25, 2011

2:45pm 17C overcast

From this distance, things look much the same this week as last, but spring is definitely springing. We had some terrible icy weather since last Monday, but we've had some lovely mild and sunny days, too.

In the last couple of days, the Trout Lilies have started to emerge. I found this description at Andy's Northern Ontario Wildflowers (a wonderful resource!):

Forms a colony of 1-leaved sterile shoots with no flowers and a few 2-leaved fertile plants with flowers. The mottled leaves resemble the skin pattern of a brook trout. The Trout Lily is pollinated by ants, and after a seed is planted, it takes up to seven years for a mature plant to grow and flower. Trout Lily has a fascinating seed dispersal mechanism - its seeds are dispersed by ants through a process called myrmecochory (pronounced "mirme ko ko re"). Attached to the outside of the seeds is a fleshy structure called an elaiosome. The elaiosome is rich in oils and proteins. Ants carry the seed to their nest and feed the elaiosome to their larvae. The remaining seed is discarded in the ant's nutrient-rich waste pile. This symbiotic relationship benefits the ant, which gets a food source, and benefits the plant because the seed is dispersed, is protected from rodents, and is placed in a nutrient rich area in the ants nest where the seed has a greater likelihood of growing.

I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now

Today is the first day of my 46th trip around the sun. When this picture was taken, I was 10 or 11, and it was around this time that I begged my mother to let me quit school. I figured that I knew enough reading, writing and arithmetic so that I could take it from there myself. I guess I was a natural born unschooler. My mother was not.

I've learned and unlearned and forgotten a lot of things since then. Every year I learn a bunch of new things and discover a bunch of other stuff I thought I knew, I didn't. My catalogue of uncertainties is growing all the time. Which is completely ok by me. I figure I've got a few more trips in me yet, and I wouldn't want to get bored.