This month I’ve decided to put a little twist on Bloom Day and make a photography exercise out of it. I’ve been experimenting with taking pictures during the Blue Hour, which is the period of time post-sunset when a bluish glow fills the sky. The resulting images are softly lit and dreamlike.
Many of the plants growing wild in my yard are blooming this month. The Chollas are blooming like crazy in a variety of colors ranging from yellow through maroon.
Look at the gold pollen falling onto the petals!
Cholla of unknown species.
The Opuntias are going crazy too. They also have a variety of colors, depending on the species.
Opuntia, also of unknown species.
This is also an Opuntia, though not much like the usual Prickly Pear. It’s more like a Cholla. The flowers are small, cream-colored, and seemingly unspectacular, but they push their petals back in a way that makes them look like little stars. At dusk, they glow in the light, while the yellows, oranges, and reds of the other Opuntias and Chollas fade into the darkness. Nice effect, and great for a moon garden!
Opuntia leptocaulis, aka Christmas Cactus for the red fruits in winter.
This Acacia doesn’t have the greatest form, and though it can be limbed up or otherwise pruned under control, it doesn’t have a particularly nice branching pattern. It looks best left to grow its own way, into a large, sprawly shrubby thing. It’s a good plant to put out of the way, mixed into a wild part of the garden, but close enough that you can smell the incredible fragrance when it blooms.
Acacia smallii.
There are a few of these growing around my yard. Not a favorite at all, even though the yellow splash of flowers is almost redeeming, for that brief period they exist. These reseed like a weed, have no scent to recommend the flowers that aren’t much different than many other better species, are messy (leaf drop and flower drop), and have a horrid growth form. They just shoot out branches in an excessive fashion, and no amount of artful pruning will get them to behave. There is nothing redeeming about these nasty things, and they will be cut down in the near future. I’ve been informed they’ve been moved in Cercidium, but I still call them Parkinsonias, as the Cercidiums are beautiful plants that don’t deserve to be mingling with such a thuggish hideous species.
Parkinsonia aculeata. Very weedy and irritating.
Agave lophantha is not native to my area, but a number of them were planted around the yard and they’ve spread into large clumps, providing me with a few bloomers every year. These spikes look great popping up amongst the native cactus around the yard. Very tough plants, as I don’t give them any extra water. Nasty, nasty teeth on the leaves that can slice you open easily, so even though I plan to spread some of the pups around the yard, they’ll be kept in out-of-the-way places, where the flower spikes can do their thing without risk of disemboweling a gardener.
Agave lophantha bloom spike.
Here’s a familiar plant from my time in Ohio: the Arborvitae. Many of the common evergreens, including Junipers, turn out to do really well here in the desert. Little did I know till I moved to the Southwest how many native Junipers and other evergreens there are here! What I like most about this guy is the bluish fruit. Another good moon garden plant, as the fruits glow at dusk and in the moonlight, while the dark green foliage totally disappears.
Cool bluish fruit on the Arborvitae.
This is an oddity: an onion from the grocery store that started sprouting on my countertop. So I stuck it in the ground a couple months ago, and now it’s blooming. More beautiful than I expected! Look at the skinny green stripes on the white petals!
The grocery store onion!
To see the rest of the Garden Blogger’s Bloom Day entries, go here.
