December garden flowers in MtLawleyShire

Despite the heat of an early summer, there are many flowers in people’s gardens, along garden walls, on verges, which makes walking somewhere slow going 🙂

Hibiscus:

 

 

 

Crepe Myrtle in so many colours:

 

 

 

 

tallow candles:

Magnolia in my garden:

 

sunlight absorbers: marigold and poppy-like:

 

Mexican rose and crab-apple flower:

 

yarrow flowers and honeysuckle:

 

and others, the last being morning-glory all closed for the evening:

 

 

MtlawleyShire’s Roses in December – Yellow and Apricot

Yellow and Apricot roses I have photographed in December.  The variety of yellows, of the shape of the buds, flowers outrageously flirtatious and shy and shadowed – all are beautiful.

Buds:

  

 

 

 

 

 

and opening to fully open.

 

 

 

 

Sunflowers and a Bee in MtLawleyShire

Who doesn’t love sunflowers?  These were way taller than me (OK, not tall, me, but even so) and I had trouble taking decent photographs.  I swear they were six foot tall!  Lovely though 🙂

 

But – what is here?  Ooo – bee on sunflower!

Busy bee moving slowly through the intricate landscape of the sunflower’s centre:

 

head down, bum up – so much pollen a bee could get drunk 🙂

bee traversing the pollen-laden circles

and this is the best shot of pollen-dusted bee and petal bases, and the lovely interior landscape of the flower.

 

MtLawleyShire 2016 calendars #4: waterdrops on roses

This is a ‘specialty’ post – I hae had one enquiry for such photos.  Doesn’t mean no-one else can enjoy them 🙂  Most of these would be included in a calendar.

Roses after rain.

Red:

 

 

 

Deeper red:

 

Yellow and apricot roses:

 

 

& one lone pink (that’s in my garden):

 

They are pretty.  It has not, I have learned on going through my photos, rained a lot this year at all 😦

But these are pretty 🙂

Mtlawleyshire’s 2016 calendars: 1: Wildflowers

These are photos from which I will choose those to go into the 2016 Wildflowers Calendar.  There are too many photos (soooo many!  I *do* like photographing flowers) for one calendar, but it is merely to present what will likely be included rather that what definitely will be.

Bottlebrush types:

 

 

 

Grevillea:

 

 

 

 

 

 

paper daisies:

 

trees:

 

 

 

blue leschenaultia:

 

pea flowers:

 

 

myrtle types (fluffballs):

 

 

 

 

Banksia;

others (don’t know their names or types) – & some may be cultivars or not native:

 

 

 

 

& kangaroo paws – cultivars but lovely

 

 

If you wish to order a Wildflowers Calendar, let me know.

 

Mid-October Rain in MtLawleyShire

It rained today – in an October that has seen more dryness and heat than is normal.  So I celebrate with a page of photos of raindrops.

On leaves of jasmine:

 

 

on jasmine flowers:

 

 

 

on leaves of dragon trees:

petunia leaves:

on dead tendrils:

 

on petunia flowers:

 

scorched roses:

 

daisies (& the alien exotic is a hoarder, even when barely open):

 

magnolia bud:

and on Bauhinia buds & flowers:

  

MtLawleyShire’s Buhenia flowers

Buhenia are huge, magnificent trees.  Wide and tall, wonderful beings.  they lose their leaves and flower in Spring, grow leaves and the flowers become long bean-like sed pods that in February spring open explosively, shooting teh seeds far & wide.

A few years ago, I lived on the top floor in a small apartment block – the 3rd floor – and outside the flats was a huge buhenia tree.  A white one.  It was wonderful looking at the flowers at night – it looked like a Japanese painting.

When the seeds were dispersed, all of us in the flats became accustomed to the seeds hitting the balconies and windows.  And they fell into my potplants.  I ended up with a  veritable forest of them – seedlings that continued to grow.  The landlords took most of them (with my permission & thanks) and I was left with two.  I have planted one out the front where the growing conditions aren’t brilliant, but it is growing, slowly.  It has yet to have flowers.

The other is in a pot in my courtyard, and while it hasn’t grown very big, it has in teh last two years, begun flowering.

The other day, when we had a little rain, there were clouds in the east and sunlight in the west – for a moment.  The white of the flowers against that sky was just beautiful:

 

and with the bright sunlight on them against a blue sky:

 

Just a short post.

 

Raindrops in MtLawleyShire

And not much more than raindrops.  Our promised rain amounted to 1.8 mm in MtLawleyShire – which is barely enough to wet the soil.

It was good for some photos, though other areas of my wee courtyard remained quite dry.

the daisies received some of the glittering bounty:

 

the alien exotic hoarded:

and the rosebud was gifted:

the ‘wild’ parsley caught some, as did the empty hook:

 

but mostly, the drops were entangled in the now flowering jasmine – amass of flowers and sparkles, leaves, tendrils and tangles:

some closer shots of leaves and tendrils and buds:

 

 

 

 

& I love this shot!

Now to the flowers:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

and this – epitome of a pure white jasmine flower:

Flowers in MtLawleyShire

But we will start in the city with flowers and bees in the small city orchard.  A riot of colour, of beauty.

Borage

Borage and bees

 

more flowering herbs: yarrow and tansy

 

& I know this is a herb, but can I think of the name?  No 😀

A sort of poppy (though it’s probably not)

and in a brighter orange variety – a bee burrows for the rich nectar & pollen

Action shot!

Paper daisies, eternally cheerful

 

a solitary blossom in a courtyard

This should be up with the herbs: valerian flowers:

 

and to my delight – a cornflower.  That blue is just lovely.

 

one of these is a marigold, and the other – pretty but unknown.

 

Kangaroo paw en masse:

 

and these were my delight – when I was a child, we had yellow ones in our garden and called them ‘granny’s bonnets’.  They are columbines 🙂

 

 

 

In MtLawleyShire itself, there are still bottlebrush flowers.  I love the pink variety.  So delicate:

 

some flowers seen in a verge garden:

 

the stunning architecture of a dandelion seed head:

the heavily perfumed flowers of the rainforest tree – they are street trees and I walk through perfumed air sometimes

roses in one of the gardens I walk past:

 

 

and a bee on a clump of roadside lavender

but here – this is the prettiest flower of them all 🙂

 

Flowers & excitement in – & for – MtLawleyShire

Friday was sunny but very windy, not much of a chance for photos but I got some flowers:

2 shades of pink on a pink bottlebrush:

 

blossom in the shadows:

fragrant jasmine in the lee of a wall:

 

daisies sheltered by being low on the ground:

and the little daisy feral from South Africa that so many Australian children (me included) remember for daisy chains:

the Walcott Street/Beaufort Street intersection with some art deco architecture on one side, and the view towards the city:

 

& the building of the clouds:

Saturday the clouds divulged all their promise: it was all house cleaning while it rained & stormed outside.

Sunday?

Sunday I went to the city.  These two photos are outside the Perth Convention centre: sunlight coming through leaves and the convention centre itself.

  

inside the convention centre – this happened: I was awarded my doctorate

We went to a conference in England together and graduated together – magic 🙂

me with a new little friend as a mark of teh occasion from friends who came with me:

& some shots of the city as we drove home to sandwiches and champagne:

 

  

I am slowly returning to earth.  Sandwiches & champagne were wonderful with friends & supporters of my long PhD journey.  Those years also gav  e me photography and painting.

Now to apply it 😀