Autumn is a colorful time with tree leaves turning red, orange and yellow. Apples, crabapples and cranberries are in season and they give colors to the landscape as well with their reds, greens and yellows.
Wild Red Berries of Autumn
Mature fruits from smaller plants draw one’s attention to their different shapes in bright red colors. We found three such fruits in our local state park.
Welcome back to Flower Poetry Fridays with Mrs. Sigourney. Each Friday a new poem will be posted from her The Voice Of Flowers.
THE HARE-BELL;
A DEDICATION FOR AN ANNUAL, WITH
THAT TITLE.
YE have seen me oft, ‘mid the summer day,
In my woodland home, with the breeze at play ;
Catching the dews as they sparkling fell,
And folding them close in each floral bell ;
And teaching my buds, with a joyous ray,
To lift their blue eyes to the King of Day.
But now, when the last leaf of Autumn is shed,
Ye thought, no doubt, I was sere and dead :
No, no ! I have baffled the Spoiler’s sting,
Affection’s token to you to bring.
I have dared the wrath of the frosty sky,
To gather you blossoms that cannot die.
Will ye welcome me in from my toil and care,
For the blessings I breathe, and the sweets I
bear?
If ye give me shelter this wintry hour,
If ye make me a guest at the hearth and bower,
You will never regret, I am fain to say,
The Hare-Bell’s visit, this Christmas-day.
So, is Mrs. Sigourney saying that this hare-bell plant can be taken indoors and be revived to receive a flower? Not sure about that. Perhaps she’s referring to the fact that it will bloom longer into the year in the UK when compared to America.
Any ideas?
Come back next Friday for the next installment in our series of flower poems from Mrs. Sigourney’s The Voice of Flowers, “Evening Flowers”.
What’s a sunflower without petals? A little inconspicuous, I’d say!
Beggar-Ticks Flowers Without PetalsThe plant we’re looking at today is called Beggar-Ticks and it’s a member of the Compositae, the Family of Composites or Daisy-like flowers.
The sepals make the posies look like flowers, but with green “petals”.
Looks like the kind of flower that I would draw — I’m no artist with a pencil!
Autumn is here. The heat of summer is gone and there’s a chill on the breeze. Tree leaves are changing colors with some even falling to the ground already.
Taking a walk in the park we saw lots of asters and goldenrods in bloom this past week. The Touch-Me-Nots and Thoroughworts were still flowering but not for much longer.
Perennial Turtlehead Plant in Bloom
Near the edge of the road and tucked behind a large purple-flowering aster was this late summer blooming plant I’ve never seen before. It had large flowers compared to the aster.
Each stem of the plant, or perhaps it was a small grouping of plants, was topped with a cluster of flower buds and the lowest of them open.
The flowers were white and some of them tinged with pink at the tips. Each blossom appeared to have only two large petals with the top petal arching over the lower one.
Turtlehead Flowers With Toothed Leaves
A sideways view shows how this plant apparently got its name, “Turtlehead”.
(Click on any image to see a larger view.)
Turtlehead, Chelone glabra, is a member of the Snapdragon Family, Scrophulariaceae, and native to the Eastern United States and Canada.
If the road crews aren’t too aggressive, we should be able to see this native plant next year as it’s a perennial.
The lance-shaped, toothed leaves are oppositely arranged on the stems. They must be quite tasty to insects judging by the number of leaves with holes and half-eaten ones.
The whole plant is smooth from the stems and leaves to the flowers; it rises 2-3 ft. tall.
We should be able to find more White Turtleheads growing in damp, moist areas of wetlands, near springs or seeps, and areas adjacent to rivers.
It can be a nice addition to gardens if kept watered well and grown in partial shade. Blooming period is late summer into fall.
Photos taken 19 September 2015 at Little Buffalo State Park, Newport, PA.
Welcome back to Flower Poetry Fridays with Mrs. Sigourney. Each Friday a new poem will be posted from her The Voice Of Flowers.
SPRING BLOSSOMS TO THE
MOURNER.
THOU bringest violets in thy hand,
Sweet Spring. Thy gifts how vain
To soothe us for those fair, blue eyes,
That ope no more again.
Thou bringest music of the birds,
As if such strain could pay
For their melodious speech, who sank
From our lone bowers away.
Thou showerest breathing roses round,
To blush on beauty’s breast ;
Give back ! give back those lips of rose,
That to our own were prest.
Thou know’st to burst the tyrant gloom
Of Winter’s icy urn ;
Teach them to break the envious tomb,
And to our arms return.
Thou canst not ! To our grieving souls
Thy boasted spell is o’er ;
From all thy gifts to those we turn,
Whom thou canst ne’er restore.
To those o’er whom thy quicken’d turf,
With earliest snow-drops grows ,
Yet fails to wake their wonted smile,
Or move their deep repose.
Yes ; from thy charms to Him we turn,
Who laid our treasures low,
And, with a Father’s love, ordains
Our discipline of woe :
We look to that unsullied clime,
Where storm shall never sweep ;
Nor fickle Spring the heart beguile,
Nor drooping mourner weep.
Death has a way of bringing us to think about our own longevity. And to ponder the Great Beyond.
Spring is a time of awakening for the souls who remain on Earth. All the beauty that Nature has to offer may help us through the grieving process when we lose someone dear, but nothing can bring back our friends who’ve passed on to another life.
Mrs. Sigourney can only soothe her lonesome heart by looking upward to the heavens and by having faith that one day they will meet again.
Come back next Friday for the next installment in our series of flower poems from Mrs. Sigourney’s The Voice of Flowers, “The Hare-Bell”.
A walk in the park took us through a section of trees that were left standing next to the river. The trail followed the river and at a clearing there was this flowering vine that held fast to a tree trunk.
Bur-Cucumber Vines Up A Tree
This vine was growing in an area at the edge of woods where it received partial sunlight, morning sun for sure.
The vine snaked through the grass, scrambled over some weeds about knee-high, and then climbed up a tree for a few feet.
Curly tendrils helped the long plant fasten itself to vegetation as it grew.
Star-like Staminate Flowers of Bur-Cucumber
(Photos taken 23 August 2015. Click on any image for a larger view.)
Several small white flowers were grouped together each with five broad petals that gave each blossom a star-like appearance.
Welcome back to Flower Poetry Fridays with Mrs. Sigourney. Each Friday a new poem will be posted from her The Voice Of Flowers.
THE TRAVELLED FLOWER. Daisy After the Rain
A DAISY, which once grew on the banks of
the Thames, in England, had been transplant-
ed and brought to this country. It bore the
voyage well, and flourished in the garden
where it was placed.
A Cowslip, its nearest neighbor, was very
kind, and if it ever looked sad, like a stranger,
cheered it, and spoke words of comfort. It
asked much of its adventures on the ocean,
and of its native land. So it told its friend the
Cowslip, whatever it desired to know.
It described the ship sailing quietly over the
great waters, and its pleasant intercourse with
a pansy that bore it company. " We stood
side by side on a shelf, in the room of the per-
son, with whom we emigrated.
"The Pansy was blessed with a large family
of fine children, and I had two promising in-
fants when I began the voyage. But they pin-
ed for the free air, and the fresh dews of the
valley where they were born.
" I was ever watching and nursing them.
One night, we were alarmed by great confu-
sion and noise, and a chill that struck us to the
heart. We heard a cry of "icebergs" and
peeping through the window of our state room,
saw monstrous masses of cold glittering ice
floating around us.
" Then I heard the Pansy whispering to her
little ones, not to be afraid to die. But I trem-
bled with terror. That very night my young-
est darling died. And had it not been for the
care of my other drooping babe, I think I should
have died too.
" The next day, they said we were out of dan-
ger, and the keen wintry cold passed away.
And though we arrived safely, and I am happy in
my new home, I never can bear to think of the
voyage where my poor little one perished."
The kind neighbor could not help shiver-
ing with sympathy at the tale of sorrow. " I
have heard people who walk in the garden, call
you the Daisy of Runnimede. What can they
mean by such a hard name ?" asked the Cow-
slip.
" It is a delightful green vale in England,
where, in old times, a king signed a paper,
which gave the people freedom. For that rea-
son it is visited as a sort of sacred place.
" My birth there, was all that gave me value
in the eyes of my owner, and procured me the
privilege of travelling to see distant lands."—
Many things the Daisy related, so that the
Cowslip, thus daily instructed, knew almost
as much of foreign countries as if it had been
there.
A Dandelion lived near, but did not incline
to listen to these adventures. Indeed, she
ridiculed the way in which her neighbors
spent so much of their time, and said for her
part, she had something else to do.
She thanked her stars she was not a blue,
—no ! not she ! nor a pedant neither. The
vanity of those travelled people was extremely
ridiculous, always talking about what they had
seen. She laughed loudly at the Cowslip, call-
ing her an antiquarian, and said she wondered
what good came from being such a deal wiser
than other people.
A Sage-plant, who had cast off his blossoms,
and gone to seed, heard her flippancy of speech
and reproved her. He said, " knowledge is
good ; it teaches men how to be useful to each
other, and keeps women from too much gad-
ding abroad.
" By knowledge, my own salubrious proper-
ties have been discovered, so that I am not
cut down like a common weed. Right
knowledge teaches both men and flowers not
to be slanderous, for it gives them higher and
better subjects of thought."
So the Dandelion was silent before the Sage
and ceased to laugh at those who were wiser
than herself. For she had already perceived
that they had some kind of secret happiness,
and took comfort when other flowers were out
of spirits, on stormy days, and when no butter-
flies visited them.
Knowledge is good!
The emigrant daisy shares her knowledge of the world with her neighbors, so in a way she was teaching them about new lands and places that they had never witnessed.
To gain the power of knowledge all one has to do is listen, said the wise old sage. The sage plant offered, “By knowledge, my own salubrious properties have been discovered, so that I am not cut down like a common weed.”
The properties of sage that promote well-being and a healthy mind and body are said to be many, including desirable anti-inflammatory and anti-microbial properties.
The silly dandelion scoffed at them who would share their stories thinking them loud and obnoxious show-offs. That is, until the sage put the yellow slanderous flower in her place. She simply didn’t know what she was talking about, yet complained just the same.
Knowledge gives us better and higher thoughts to think!
Come back next Friday for the next installment in our series of flower poems from Mrs. Sigourney’s The Voice of Flowers, “Spring Blossoms to the Mourner”.
Wild Impatiens Native to America Orange and Yellow Touch-Me-Nots
Along roads and in culverts, especially near a little shade, grow these strange-looking flowers that appear sort of like a trumpet with parted lips on one end and a curly tail on the opposite end.
Their red-spotted orange or yellow flowers invite bees of all kinds and would be excellent additions to gardens where tall plants are desired. Growing 3 to 5 feet tall, they often tip to the side with windy or rainy weather.
Note: If you’re gardening with these Native American Impatiens, you might want to use some type of garden stake to keep them held high.
The two plants are closely related species of Impatiens referred to as Jewelweeds or Touch-Me-Nots.
Flowers and Buds of Spotted Touch-Me-Not
The orange-flowered Jewelweed, Impatiens capensis, is called Spotted Touch-Me-Not.
Flower Opening Up Near Buds of Pale Touch-Me-Not
It’s yellow-flowering cousin, I. pallida, is called Pale Touch-Me-Not.
The plants are very similar except for the different flower colors and that the paler, yellow one has a shorter spur at the end of the tubular flower.
The Jewelweeds start flowering in July and may bloom to October.
Stand of Touch-Me-Nots Near the River
A grouping of mostly the orange flowers had a few yellow flowers mixed in the bunch at Millerstown Park, which is adjacent to the Juniata River. They were in a partially shaded area growing under a small grouping of oak trees.
We usually see pure stands of one species or the other. This is the first time I’ve witnessed both kinds flowering side-by-side and I’m wondering if that isn’t typical. Anybody care to share their blooming observations on these odd flowers?
to keep them held high.
