After reading yesterday’s post, Janet, who lives in Connecticut, tried to post this picture in her comment. It’s a bottle of maple syrup! But my blog doesn’t support pictures in comments so she texted it to me and I decided to share it here. Thank you for the sweet gesture, my friend! It brought back to my mind the memory of a spring equinox we shared fifteen years ago, when we went to the Hebron Maple Festival. I miss the smell of boiling maple sap in New England. AI describes it “as a woodsy, caramel-like fragrance that signifies the start of spring and the process of making maple syrup.”
When the Spring is in the offing, And the early birds are freezing, When one-half the folks are coughing, And the other half are sneezing; When the sun is getting higher, Though the fact’s hard to remember; And you huddle by the fire Twice as cold as in December; Life and all its cares would crush us, Floor us in a brace of shakes, If it weren’t for the luscious Maple syrup on the cakes.
But a fellow keeps postponing Day by day his preparation For the final telephoning For old Charon’s transportation. Though he knows the Spring is lying And his grippe is undiminished, Still he does put off his dying Till that can of syrup’s finished. Then, at last, the north winds waver, And the sleeping Spring awakes; But we know the true lifesaver Was the syrup on the cakes!
~ Walter G. Doty (The Christian Advocate, March 22, 1917)
The UNC college students were off campus for their spring break so we took advantage of temporary free street parking and visited Coker Arboretum, which is one of the botanical garden’s properties. It was a chilly, gray day, which made the pops of color we saw seem all the brighter. The lovely deciduous saucer magnolias were starting to bloom, ahead of putting out their leaves.
saucer magnolia
Draw me a Robin — on a stem — So I am hearing him, I’ll dream, And when the Orchards stop their tune — Put my pretense — away — ~ Emily Dickinson (The Poems of Emily Dickinson, #239)
Chinese redbud
My mother had a dearly loved andromeda planted by our house, right beside the dining room window. Birds would perch on it while waiting their turn at the feeder, which was attached to that window. As a child, I loved watching the morning birds while I was eating my own breakfast. Mom also said her favorite flower was lily of the valley, which looks very similar to these andromeda blossoms, and is why the shrub is often called a lily-of-the-valley bush.
andromeda aka lily-of-the-valley bush
golden ragwort
Japanese camellia
bridal wreath spirea
‘spectabilis’ border forsythia
‘waterlily’ star magnolia
English primrose
flowering quince
It’s always nice to find a little sign identifying the tree, shrub or flowers I am looking at, confirming or disputing my guesses. There were plenty of robins and sparrows singing and flitting about, and we even saw and heard a towhee, but none of them would stay put for half a second to let me capture a picture! This is our second spring in North Carolina and it’s proving to be every bit as enchanting as our first one.
Tuesday’s visit to the botanical garden was bright and sunny, and we enjoyed seeing the gentle, even light of the approaching equinox illuminating grasses, spring ephemerals, and shrub buds and blooms. Every year before spring arrives there are controlled burns in some of the piedmont and coastal plain gardens, and we happened to catch sight of one that day. We even spotted a squirrel along a path, so busy eating a bundle of plant stocks and leaves that he didn’t notice how close we were to him.
I can scroll and worry indoors, or I can step outside and remember how it feels to be part of something larger, something timeless, a world that reaches beyond me and includes me, too. The spring ephemerals have only the smallest window for blooming, and so they bloom when the sunlight reaches them. Once the forest becomes enveloped in green and the sunlight closes off again, they will wait for the light to come back. ~ Margaret Renkl (The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year)
dimpled trout lily
little sweet Betsy
‘lemon drop’ swamp azalea
‘Georgia blue’ speedwell
Lenten rose
By Chivalries as tiny, A Blossom, or a Book, The seeds of smiles are planted — Which blossom in the dark. ~ Emily Dickinson (The Poems of Emily Dickinson, #37)
weeping forsythia
The native wildflowers and grasses in these gardens beds evolved with periodic wildfires, which keep trees and shrubs from growing in and return nutrients to the soil. In a few weeks, new growth will be emerging from the ashes. ~ North Carolina Botanical Garden (Facebook, March 10, 2025)
a yearly controlled burn in the Coastal Plain Habitat
So many simple ‘chivalries’ exist and noticing even a few of them can bring us great pleasure and help us to ‘remember how it feels to be a part of something larger.’
As we walked along the Streamside Trail, our Merlin Bird ID app indicated that we were hearing a phoebe singing. I was delighted to finally spot the little sweetheart and get a couple of pictures before he flew away to the next tree.
eastern phoebe
first spider web spotted this year
After walking that trail we went through a back gate into the botanical garden to see what signs of spring we could find there.
3.4.25 ~ North Carolina Botanical Garden
An American hazelnut shrub (close-up above) was flowering. The dangling yellow catkins are male and the tiny magenta flowers are female, but the shrub does not self-pollinate. We’ll have to come back in the fall to see if there will be any hazelnuts on this one.
‘Arnold Promise’ witch hazel
A walk through the Mountain Habitat provided glimpses of a few spring ephemerals just getting started…
dimpled trout lily
It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold — when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade. ~ Charles Dickens (Great Expectations)
tufted titmouse
We stopped by the bird blind at the Children’s Wonder Garden but the feeders were empty. However, scratching around on the ground with the squirrels, through a pile of discarded sunflower seed hulls, I spotted a couple of song sparrows!
song sparrow
They weren’t singing and they were hard to catch, but I was happy to capture with the camera my first song sparrow in North Carolina!
Back in January of this year, Karma (Karma’s When I Feel Like It Blog) suggested a four seasons photo hunt. I decided to include four more “seasons,” taking photos on Groundhog Day, May Day, Lammas Day and Halloween, which fall between the solstices and equinoxes. I will come back and add the final picture to this post when we get to the winter solstice.
5.31.24 ~ North Carolina Botanical Garden common yarrow
May ended on a very pleasant note, with lots of sunshine, mild temperatures and no humidity! Since we knew these conditions wouldn’t last we went out for a walk, in spite of us both being sick with colds. Who knows when such perfect weather will come around again?
bronze fennel
And of course, it being ten days since our last walk, different things were blooming. It’s never the same garden twice.
golden tickseed
bee visiting English lavender
purple coneflower
When I watched the sun rise this morning, due east, I felt that the universe, the solar system, the earth, the year, the season, the day, were still in order, no matter what stupidities man might achieve today. It is good to know such things about the place you live. It is good to know that there are certainties. ~ Hal Borland (Hal Borland’s Book of Days)
hemlock cones
woodland pinkroot
crow poison (poisonous to humans and animals)
common sanddragon dragonfly
phlox
The single greatest lesson the garden teaches is that our relationship to the planet need not be zero-sum, and that as long as the sun still shines and people still can plan and plant, think and do, we can, if we bother to try, find ways to provide for ourselves without diminishing the world. ~ Michael Pollan (Food, Inc.)
5.21.24 ~ North Carolina Botanical Garden sun-drenched female northern cardinal
It was a borderline-humidity morning, between comfy and muggy, and Tim was still coughing from the cold he caught in Italy, but we decided to chance a walk anyway. This is the time of year when the sun feels too bright and my camera sometimes responded by turning the blurry bokeh effect into solid black.
pipevine swallowtail butterfly
We forgot the bug repellent and I came home with two mosquito bites, one on each forearm. But the pretty (and non-biting) insects were out enjoying the sunshine, too! I’m not 100% sure of all my identifications here, but I’m giving them my best guess. Some of the butterflies, dragonflies and damselflies seemed new to me.
fire pink
common whitetail dragonfly
oakleaf hydrangea
dusky dancer damselfly on hemlock needles
Summer, for the cold-blooded, represents the Elysian days. Warmth brings life and animation. Their blood responds, literally, to every rise and fall of the mercury. Chill is synonymous with sluggishness, cold with immobility. The sun directly regulates the intensity with which they live. ~ Edwin Way Teale (Grasshopper Road)
white waterlily
ebony jewelwing (aka black-winged damselfly)
grass pink orchid
mating silver-spotted skipper butterflies
tulip prickly pear
variable dancer damselfly
stokes’ aster
chamomile
downy wood mint
Coastal Plain Habitat boardwalk in May
Even though it isn’t technically summer here yet, either meteorologically or astronomically, it can now be called summer for all intents and purposes!
