Our Dog is astonishingly tolerant

Tags

bird, cat and dog, Our Dog

First of the year

Tags

Erythronium oregonum, flowers, garter snake, photography, snake, spring, white fawn lily

Fawn lilies! (Erythronium oregonum)

Oh, and then there was this sun-lover. We actually saw a couple of them along a short trail, making the most of the sun when it peeked out from behind clouds.

Turn up the volume till it hurts.

That’s what our backyard sounds like these days.

It’s mating season for frogs, and they’re out there yelling their wee heads off. A couple of days ago I ventured out with my DSLR and a flashlight and managed to shoot this video. It’s not the best quality—you try standing on a pond-side rock in the pitch dark holding a camera in one hand and a flashlight in the other and then adjust the focus!—but overall I was quite pleased with the results for a first try.

Who YOU lookin’ at?

Tags

cat

Uh, oh.

Tags

rhododendron, winter

Okay, rhodos bloom early, but not this early. This is January. In Canada. A warm part of Canada, granted, but still.

Sheesh. This winter has totally sucked as far as being winter goes.

Fun with fungi

Tags

cup lichen, fungus, lichen, photography, Spathularia flavida

A wee red mushroom just peeking out of the moss.

It was a soggy day for walking in the woods, but that brings out the fungus. This is a sampling of various fungal/licheny finds.  

Yikes!

And we thought the tent caterpillars were bad. This could give me nightmares. (Via hovercraftdoggy.)

Trying something different

I’ve switched the colours on the theme so the background is black. Tell me what you think.

My feeling is that some of the photos are enhanced, but I’m not sure that the overall effect is better…. hmmm….

UPDATE: have gone back to the white background, for now at any rate.

Sisyphus

No, it's not black gold

Since we moved to this island three years ago, I’ve been amused by the dichotomy between bambi-lovers and vermin-haters. I’m not amused any more. And I’ve just taken sides.

Uh, oh.

Bad times a-comin'

See those? Those are burrs. Or they will be when they dry out and turn brown. Even soft and green, they stick to things, as I discovered when I took pictures and then wandered away to find them stuck all over my sweatpants.

This plant is northern bedstraw, Galium boreale. The burrs are small but extremely persistant. The entire plant is kinda grabby, for that matter.

I don’t know why, but there’s an awful lot of it around this year. I don’t recall seeing much of it in our yard last year, but this year it’s all over part of our property.

A part the dog visits every day.

We have a longhaired dog. I foresee a sad time for all concerned.