Backyard Blooms!

[shooter]

The Michigan cactus is doing well, maybe 4 bushes, 6+ ft each, couple 3' rs

[scstill]

Very Nice Michigan Catcus.
We get a lot of thistle here in SoCal as well
Its considered a nuisance but has really pretty flowers
Plus an actual Prickly Pear Cactus we have a lot of as well which are welcomed except when you ride into one :-(
BTW - I lived in Michigan until I was 21 then moved to SoCal

[PRR]

I hate thistle but love cactus.

Here is wild blue berry, high bush. The berries are closer to 1/4" than the 1/2" flavorless freaks of tame blue berry.

[scstill]

Blueberry is a fav.
My friend makes a mean blueberry Bundt cake every few weeks at Sat men's group
Maybe I'll get a piece next week as its my turn to play.

[murrayatuptown]

Some nice wild things growing!

I take photos of the plants year after year, just different lenses, different light and different wind velocity. Don't know why, but I still do. Crocosmia Lucifer (also come in Orange & yellow with less dramatic names).

[murrayatuptown]

Rhododendrons. There is probably something in focus somewhere in there...experiments with 8mm and 16 mm movie camera lenses on a digital mirrorless camera.

[scstill]

SoCal is rarely green this time of year (favorite color)
From this morning local hike in Whiting Ranch
Taro, Poison Oak and a great green scene

[shooter]

  Vines will win the world!

I've spent most of the summer fighting wild grapes and poison ivy

[sluckey]

Kudzu, the vine that ate the South. Extremely invasive. Some typical southern pics here...

     https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kudzu

[murrayatuptown]

Vines will win the world!

I've spent most of the summer fighting wild grapes and poison ivy

Ugh...American Bittersweet vines have made some pretty aggressive strangulation efforts on some of our trees that died for other reasons & got cut down. The vines looked like twisted branches when they got to 2+ inches thick.

[ShoemanGB]

My hops have really started coning this last week.  It's been crazy hot with with no real rain for ages.  They don't seem to care.

[shooter]

not sure on the orange flowering weed, always glad to see 'em, when everything's green, it's a nice contrast.


the hedgerow now averages 6' in height, 50' long, 10' deep

[PRR]

not sure on the orange flowering weed,....

Jewelweed?

[scstill]

Wild figs seen on todays hike to poop out in Glendora Ca
Not native as far as I know. Maybe someone's leftover from a snack 40 years ago
Have to come back when they are ripe

[shooter]

burning off a battery
the 1st head to bloom, stalks are averaging 9' tall, 2-3" diameter
was watching a bee load up on pollen, stayed so long when he left, he dropped about a foot before stabilizing his flight 

[PRR]

Indian Pipes. No chlorophyll. Don't photosynthesize. Distant kin of blueberries.

[shooter]

I've seen them here, pretty rare sight though.
had to look 'em up, they looked fungal instead of plant


The plant is mycoheterotrophic, meaning it lives in close association with a fungus from which it acquires most of its nutrition

[scstill]

its fruiting time here in SoCal
Cactus apples
Schefflera berries

[rake]

Kudzu, the vine that ate the South. Extremely invasive. Some typical southern pics here...

     https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kudzu

Kudzu is all around us but doesn't seem to grow here. North Carolina sandhills near Fort Bragg.
Drive out of "the sand" and it's everywhere!
What grows like mad here is Wisteria! Also very invasive. Seen it kill mature Southern Yellow Pine trees.
And don't step om the sand spurs either!

[sluckey]

I see a lot of Wisteria in Alabama. People have nice looking manicured 'bushes' in their yards. Very colorful in the spring. Many don't know about the massive root system that's just waiting for the day that the grass is no longer cut! Then it takes over. I see it quite often where it has grown under the street and climbing toward the sun. 

[shooter]

Cactus apples

Cactus IS my friend!  I was being stupid in NM, I was climbing an easy route up the desert sandstone, standing on a small ledge 80' up, no protection and the "plate" I was standing on started slipping, it was gonna be "all she wrote" so I grabbed at this hug Cactus bush, It held long enough to get off the plate that smashed in a zillion pieces on the ground below!
I finished the climb, then spent weeks digging out needles from my hand! loving every last one!! 

[sluckey]

Those tiny hair size needles are almost impossible to remove. You pick and scrape. You know it's still there. You can feel it, but you can't see it!

[shooter]

 
yep, the long hard one's were easy, even the couple that managed "in one side out the other" of my palm!!
Climbed in AZ, properly, but after 3 days the rope was so needled up I had to junk it!!   

[shooter]

about 15 heads 6-10" so far, the largest is about a ft dia.

[scstill]

when we ride too fast and the cactus gets in the way "cactus butt" often results
and why is it that cactus needles always seem to be designed as a barbed fishing hook

[PRR]

barbed fishing hook

Porcupine too.

Live ones I can avoid, but there was a long-dead one behind an old car I looked at, and I took a quill in my forefinger. Hey, I'm smarter than the dog who took a mouthful at midnight.

[shooter]

fall blooms

[sluckey]

Fall blackberries are here. Not many berries but they are huge. Is that crazy? 

[PRR]

Not my backyard but.

New Jersey backyards make the best tomatoes. (If you want to fight, form a line.) Commercial tomatoes are weird genes, picked green and reddened with gas. A friend came up from Jersey and bought these beauties from her yard. The "stripes" are from flower-stubs and weather and utterly natural for real tomatoes, as opposed to the plastic-wood tomatoes which ship better and look better in the store, but have no flavor.

I really don't need to eat 10 pounds of tomatoes this week but somebody has to do it (and it won't be Porky).

[sluckey]

Make some salsa!

[shooter]

Ya, gimmie spots on my apples, lab modified food is spooky stuff!
I grew "wrinkle seed" corn this year, heirloom seeds from 1850's lineage, typical ear ~6" long, 1.5" diameter.
the raccoons decimated the crops but managed to salvage 2, tasty, also enough of the ripped open ones the raccoons got to harvest twice the seeds I had this year for next year's planting, which will include a better fence with electricity 


been rainy so no pic yet, I have an Apple tree that decided since it's 40 degrees now in the AM it produced blossoms!!!
30+ years here, that's a new one on me!

[PRR]

Not blooms but backyard. 2am, two deer come to munch the pear tree that the f*cking porcupines already ate to a nub. Since we metal-wrapped that tree, they didn't stay more than 2 minutes.

[sluckey]

Well it's the middle of October and the Jalapeños are still going strong. Lots of peppers and new blooms. They will last until first frost which is usually around Thanksgiving Day.

We have been eating pepper poppers since July. These peppers are also tasty grilled on a steak or diced for fresh salsa. Yum, yum!

[shooter]

i'd call 'em an excuse for eating bacon! 

[sluckey]

Satsumas are turning orange. Should be ready by Thanksgiving.

[shooter]

 
had to look it up

[scstill]

Poinsettia is turning red (a first for me)
Hopefully will be all red by Christmas :-)

[sluckey]

Poinsettia is a neat plant.

[Lectroid]

i'd call 'em an excuse for eating bacon! 

Who needs an excuse? 

[sluckey]

i'd call 'em an excuse for eating bacon! 

Who needs an excuse? 

Certainly not a southern country boy!

[scstill]

A little rain and a little green in Whiting Wilderness SoCal
Can't remember wild grasses turning green this early (more like Dec/Jan)
Hope it stays

And an Ancient Cal Juniper on top of Bertha Peak above Big Bear Lake Ca

[shooter]

Up here it's Harvest and herd'n season, plenty of bacon for all 
20 miles south a new automated hog processing plant is up n runnin, uses water knives.  my understanding it's sorta like CNC for pigs 


Got about 1/3 - 1/2 next year's wood ready for stacking as this year's wood gets used


You gotta be in the right frame of mind to herd leaves 
we 1st got here Pam was raised suburban, so She's all about rakes n tarps and....  I got out the lawn mower, showed her how red-neck engineers do it 


The burning bush is way past prime, still photo worthy.  was a dwarf that after 5 years wasn't havin it, so now it's a proper bush 

[shooter]

leftovers
left these for the birds, picked clean last month

[sluckey]

I really like those snow sunflowers!

[scstill]

This is as close as we get here in SoCal lowlands to snowy plants
Called desert broom. Right off the bike trail

[shooter]

that looks like a sneeze just waiting to happen. 


if my camper passes the road test, you have me longing for a desert trip, it's been 6 years!

[scstill]

Some delicate flowers found on todays Laguna coastal wilderness hike (my backyard).
The blooming season is starting up here in SoCal

[Lectroid]

@scstill,

Used to live in Laguna-Newport-Costa Mesa.  I know those hills very well.  And miss them.  You're heading into the 'green hills' season.  Ever get out to the wildflowers in spring in Joshua Tree?

[scstill]

Yes I think we will do some camping in Joshua Tree Jan/Feb
Lots of great rocks to climb.
Shooter would love it

[shooter]

 
Shooter just looks now ...with a discerning eye 
I did love the desert sandstone crumbling before your eyes, definitely sphincter firming experience
Got to climb an 800ft+ in Yosemite as a youngster, that's when I knew I was addicted!