Before the swallow dares
Apr. 19th, 2009 03:57 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pameladeanOn Saturday afternoon, Eric and I went back to Eloise Butler. It was a day of thin overcast with occasional streaks of blue and occasional gleams of sun, very different from the clear skies and bright light we had on Wednesday.
We had to take a different bus, because the 9B doesn't run on weekends. This bus let us out at the corner of Glenwood Avenue and Cedar Lake Parkway, on the other side of the garden from the way we usually come. On the way we talked about plans for Fourth Street Fantasy Convention.
Electing with very little consultation to take a hiking path rather than walking on the sidewalk, we went up a very steep hill -- no, honestly, it was very steep, not just steep for Minnesota -- and, somehow missing our turn for the garden, found ourselves in a little hilly country of bare trees floored with ancient leaves: here and there a grove of paper birches or one of red pines would catch one of the ephemeral rays of sunshine. It did not look like autumn or winter. The light was too strong, and here and there on nondescript shrubs were fantastical frilly leaves or flower buds. Away in the distance an elm or maple would stand in a haze of red flowers, or a willow in a haze of greeny-yellow. I could hear spring peepers almost as soon as we got off the bus. I had heard them on Wednesday too, but Eric couldn't really pick them out from the steady roar of traffic on 394. Today, once we had climbed our steep hill and then gone down the other side, between a bog and a little lake, he could hear them too. They took no notice of us, but subsided into shocked silence when a couple of mallards landed in the water. We saw chickadees and a nuthatch.
In time we saw the fence of the garden, and got very excited, because we were on the far side of the meadow. We had often yearned over the fence in that direction, but not tried to find the path from the outside. We could see the hill in the midst of the meadow, and the solitary oak tree. Seeing it from outside was almost like looking at a miniature of it.
When we got into the garden, we went down and around the eastern side. We had come again so soon precisely because we expected big changes, but we still exclaimed a lot. There were the furled gray-green leaves of wild ginger, looking like small flattened cabbages. There was a lot more false rue anemone, much of it still settling from red into green. There was large-flowered trillium in bud. The bloodroot stood straight, its buds like white candle flames and its leaves still wrapped around the stems, what would be their undersides gray-green like the emerging wild ginger. On the west-facing slopes between the eastern path and the marsh the trout lilies were blooming. Eric pointed out that you could see, across the marsh, a faint haze of green on the tamaracks, that had been so tightly closed up on Wednesday. We saw some little birds with spotty white breasts, but didn't identify them. We went back around through the marsh. The strange red growths that I thought might be skunk cabbages were still there, not much changed. I think they're probably something else, but I have no idea what. We looked at the tamarack branches, and sure enough, each brown nubbin had a tiny spray of green needle-tips. Then we went back up to the shelter, where we sat on a bench and looked at the bus schedule. The meadow had been so golden and still last time, we decided to leave it to itself until next Wednesday. We had other plans for the evening too, and if we missed the next bus there would be a forty-minute gap in the schedule.
The bus stop is perched precariously on a closely-mown area over looking the freeway. As always, there were a couple of robins looking for worms in the grass. They moved a little further off and went on with their search. Eric spread his jacket on the grass and we waited for the bus, planning our next visit.
P.
We had to take a different bus, because the 9B doesn't run on weekends. This bus let us out at the corner of Glenwood Avenue and Cedar Lake Parkway, on the other side of the garden from the way we usually come. On the way we talked about plans for Fourth Street Fantasy Convention.
Electing with very little consultation to take a hiking path rather than walking on the sidewalk, we went up a very steep hill -- no, honestly, it was very steep, not just steep for Minnesota -- and, somehow missing our turn for the garden, found ourselves in a little hilly country of bare trees floored with ancient leaves: here and there a grove of paper birches or one of red pines would catch one of the ephemeral rays of sunshine. It did not look like autumn or winter. The light was too strong, and here and there on nondescript shrubs were fantastical frilly leaves or flower buds. Away in the distance an elm or maple would stand in a haze of red flowers, or a willow in a haze of greeny-yellow. I could hear spring peepers almost as soon as we got off the bus. I had heard them on Wednesday too, but Eric couldn't really pick them out from the steady roar of traffic on 394. Today, once we had climbed our steep hill and then gone down the other side, between a bog and a little lake, he could hear them too. They took no notice of us, but subsided into shocked silence when a couple of mallards landed in the water. We saw chickadees and a nuthatch.
In time we saw the fence of the garden, and got very excited, because we were on the far side of the meadow. We had often yearned over the fence in that direction, but not tried to find the path from the outside. We could see the hill in the midst of the meadow, and the solitary oak tree. Seeing it from outside was almost like looking at a miniature of it.
When we got into the garden, we went down and around the eastern side. We had come again so soon precisely because we expected big changes, but we still exclaimed a lot. There were the furled gray-green leaves of wild ginger, looking like small flattened cabbages. There was a lot more false rue anemone, much of it still settling from red into green. There was large-flowered trillium in bud. The bloodroot stood straight, its buds like white candle flames and its leaves still wrapped around the stems, what would be their undersides gray-green like the emerging wild ginger. On the west-facing slopes between the eastern path and the marsh the trout lilies were blooming. Eric pointed out that you could see, across the marsh, a faint haze of green on the tamaracks, that had been so tightly closed up on Wednesday. We saw some little birds with spotty white breasts, but didn't identify them. We went back around through the marsh. The strange red growths that I thought might be skunk cabbages were still there, not much changed. I think they're probably something else, but I have no idea what. We looked at the tamarack branches, and sure enough, each brown nubbin had a tiny spray of green needle-tips. Then we went back up to the shelter, where we sat on a bench and looked at the bus schedule. The meadow had been so golden and still last time, we decided to leave it to itself until next Wednesday. We had other plans for the evening too, and if we missed the next bus there would be a forty-minute gap in the schedule.
The bus stop is perched precariously on a closely-mown area over looking the freeway. As always, there were a couple of robins looking for worms in the grass. They moved a little further off and went on with their search. Eric spread his jacket on the grass and we waited for the bus, planning our next visit.
P.
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bloodroot
Date: 2009-04-19 11:50 pm (UTC)When I lived outside Boston I used to go to The Garden in the Woods in Framingham. They have double-flowered bloodroot there, with many identical oval petals, like a bird ruffling its feathers. They also have double-flowered trillium, which is a whorl of pointed petals like a snow sculpture. I wouldn't want to give up the single forms, but the doubles are different flowers entirely.
Re: bloodroot
Date: 2009-04-20 12:18 am (UTC)I've seen double-flowered trillium, which is indeed amazing, but never the double bloodroot. Maybe I can find a garden cultivar.
P.
Re: bloodroot
Date: 2009-04-20 01:11 am (UTC)K.
Re: bloodroot
Date: 2009-04-20 05:09 am (UTC)P.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 12:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 12:17 am (UTC)P.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 01:13 am (UTC)I loved reading about your day of exploring.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 05:10 am (UTC)It would have been extremely interesting if it had been real ginger. I've seen it in the Como Park Conservatory, so I'd recognize it. It would look awfully odd in Eloise Butler right now, though.
P.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 12:44 pm (UTC)When I went hiking in Hawaii,we would often come across it.
Re: Before the swallow dares
Date: 2009-04-20 04:52 am (UTC)Re: Before the swallow dares
Date: 2009-04-20 05:10 am (UTC)P.
It's April, though
Date: 2009-04-20 12:17 pm (UTC)Re: It's April, though
Date: 2009-04-20 10:38 pm (UTC)P.
Re: It's April, though
Date: 2009-04-20 11:13 pm (UTC)(I just feed sunflower chips to both the squirrels and the birds.)
Re: It's April, though
Date: 2009-04-21 11:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 10:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-04-20 10:37 pm (UTC)P.
no subject
Date: 2009-04-22 02:08 pm (UTC)