I have a small collection of plant images from around the Estates, so we’re finally getting to those now, before we have more critters.
I mentioned previously about the new hibiscus (Malvaceae) plant, and so we’ll concentrate on the part that everyone thinks about when they think ‘hibiscus,’ except for Hawai’i and hula dancers and all that stuff.
These are the first blooms, having opened overnight and so that’s when I shot them, not long after a rain. The blossoms are of course huge, these being perhaps even bigger than average at somewhere around 20cm across. Or do we need to see them during the day?
It would be easy to believe they’re bleached out here in the sunlight, comparing them to the previous image, but it really does seem like they lose a bit of saturation when they open fully. Or it could be both.
The flowers last a day, really no more than that, but this one had numerous buds so it’s been in bloom steadily for the past few weeks. We got it partially just to have one within reach; there were two other hibiscus plants on the property, one visible only from the kayaks, another a bit of a hike out on the island but drowned out when the water levels kept rising. This one’s safe.
Last year The Girlfriend bought seven or eight grapevine seedlings, but they remained in temporary pots while we waited for a contractor to remember that they still had a job to finish (shocking, I know,) since the location we wanted for the arbor was too close to where the contractors would be working. So they stalled in pots until mid fall before getting planted. They’d barely started climbing the arbor this year, mostly trying to run sideways instead and interfere with each other, but the seedless Marquis vine popped forth this little cluster, surprising us. Unfortunately, the deer discovered them just a couple days ago, and so we won’t have the bountiful harvest this year. Still, we believed grapevines took a few years to mature before bearing fruit, so this was a great sign at least.
We’d made several attempts at a garden at the former Walkabout Estates, but the soil simply didn’t seem adequate, and we fought with keeping a lot of our plants going, unless they were in pots. This was a shame, because the old-old Estates had remarkable soil and the garden there exploded. We’d tried one last year, the first year in the new location, but it was too exposed for the brutal heat of the summer, so we switched to a 3/4 shade location this time. Tilling that patch was a major bitch, given the running roots of both cypress and pine trees throughout the chosen location, but the soil seemed much better.
It was – the tomato plants are kicking ass, with the peppers right behind, as well as basil and several squash plants that we never planted but apparently discarded the seeds of such into the compost bin, springing forth when we mixed this into new potting soil. Since this is the first viable garden we’ve had in over a decade, we’re psyched. We’ve already had several tomatoes and basil from our garden, and they beat the ever-loving hell out of the produce you get in the grocery stores around here.
We’ve noticed two tiny little flowers that only appear in the morning, and I finally set out to get a few pics and identify them. These are tentative, based on identifying them through my Plant Net app on the smutphone, so the closest I can reasonably get (or will, for a post.) The white ones tend to open earlier and remain open longer, so we’ll start with those.
I didn’t tackle these with the macro lens, just the 18-135, so I didn’t get as close as I could’ve. Even though it was a little cooler this morning, only about 3-4° above indoor temperature, the humidity was off the scale and I still fought (and failed) to keep condensation off of the lens, so these pics all had a contrast tweak to counteract the faint fog. I know, I should have let the lens sit outside to get to ambient temperature – only I did. Glass, like metal, still remains cooler than the air it’s within, and this was enough to attract the moisture.
Anyway, these are likely the flowers of a juniper leaf plant (Polypremum procumbens,) and very tiny, looking like little more than a scattering of confetti – you can see a blade of grass in the background.
I was up a hair too early for the others.
The sun had risen, but still wasn’t reaching this spot (this is with the macro flash,) so the flowers remained closed. I’ll have to set up a time-lapse sequence for these someday, but someday when it’s not so damn humid. I’ll also have to shade the camera doing it too, since it shouldn’t sit out in the sun for the length of time that a time-lapse would take. But this time around anyway, I returned about 90 minutes later.
These were roughly three times the diameter of the white flowers, which still doesn’t make them big – give or take, 10mm across. Almost certainly, these are part of the Portulaca Genus, possibly Portulaca pilosa, which goes by the common names of chisme or Kiss Me Quick, because that’s what people do with flower names.
I have to say that, I’d seen these the previous morning when the camera wasn’t in hand, and returned in early afternoon, when there wasn’t the faintest sign or either. These here closed up by the time the sun was getting hot, mid-morning or so, meaning they have a narrow window to get pollinated – or have evolved to favor pollinators that would only be active earlier, closing up to avoid attracting others that might come later. Honestly, while it’s an interesting question, I’m not motivated to sit out in this weather and tally what kind of arthropods visit – just look at the pics, okay?