Connections

Hail-beaten!

Plant leaves show the hail damage of our 30-minute storm.

Two days ago a rogue hail storm cut a 20-block swatch across central Denver, leaving our new blooming plants battered and drooping.  We planned to go yesterday to the Botanic Gardens, forgetting about the storm as much of the city was unaffected.  Sadly the large-leafed and high-profile plants took the brunt of it. 

Some survived but without their blossoms raised to the sun

The gardeners were able to vacuum up some of the dry leaves but the mallards remain purplexed by the leafy debris on the usually glassy surface of their favorite ponds.

"Our Land"

A small pool in Willow Creek, ponderosa pines and rock cliffs

These are the things that won our hearts 38 years ago.  I was pregnant with what I thought was our second child--turned out to be twins.  My husband and I both grew up on farms and wanted our own "piece of land."  We had thought to build but when we had three babies in diapers and a 45-minute commute to work, it was not practical at the time.

Over the years we fell in love with our community,our inner-city neighborhood, our 1940-built house and our urban lifestyle.  Several times a year we would decide to go "check on" our land, to see the autumn colors of scrub oak, to climb the cliffs and look for petrified wood, to see snow on the trees and rocks or to picnic among the wild flowers.

Wild flowers covering the meadow.

Two days ago we went out to "walk on and love" our land.  We have never named it. It has always been just "The Land" or "Our Land."  When our three boys began driving, they would go out and camp among the ponderosa trees.  A group of their friends who had played soccer, done gymnastics, been on swimming teams and in Scouts with them adopted The Land as their hang-out, camp-out place. 

During their college years they would have reunion camp-outs.  One friend, studying horticulture, decided to do some "housekeeping."  He cleaned the trail from the road and placed rocks along the side.  He cut some dead or dying trees into trunks for seating and created a rock fire ring for safe campfires. The boys, and now their wives and girlfriends, even chipped in for an environmentally friendly porta-potty situated at a discreet distance from the campsite.                                                                                                                     

Fire pit in the trees, looking toward the meadow and cliffs.

Tomorrow one of the last of the former "high school group" is getting married--just two months before their 20-year high school class reunion.  I doubt that visiting The Land is one of their priorities for this weekend, but I wouldn't be surprised if some day we get a call asking if they could go out there for a while.

Tropical Atrium

Bird of Paradise plants in Denver Botanic Gardens

For three years--many years ago--we lived in Hawaii and I fell in love with tropical plants from the delicate and complicated protea to the simple green plants, some with leaves the size of elephant ears.  When its gloomy and I need a taste of color and warmth I visit the DBG atrium. 

Dew-drops on flowers after a mechanical misting.

It isn't only the charismatic plants that fascinate me.  I also love the bulbous, protruding, thorny, imperfect and oddly shaped ones--like the one below.

Other than the generic types like roses, tulips and marigolds, I usually don't remember names of plants but I am fascinated by shape, line and color of each plant and the impact of different combinations of those elements.  I like both the "messy disarray" of the wilderness and the planned effect of the public gardens.  Both have a place in my personal world.

Cloud Forest plants

Cloud Forest Tree in Denver Botanic Gardens Atrium

When I need an infusion of the tropics I go into the atrium.  The room above features a tree trunk with epiphytes, orchids, and ivy plants growing on and around it. It is one of my favorite places to visit especially in the winter when Denver has snow on the ground.

Cloud Forest room orchids

These orchids are only two of the many varieties, each with its own special color, design and shape.

Birds on vacation!

These Canadian geese found a home in the Japanese Garden.

The Denver Botanic Garden has many "squatters" among the migrating birds.  Mallards and Canadian geese choose this place to raise their ducklings and goslings.  These geese are a mated pair that have not yet made a nest.

The mallards chose a pond in Plantasia--with a Chinese theme.

These birds have chosen my two favorite sections of the gardens.  Plantasia features two moon gates, a pebbled path, a bell kiosk--and of course--Asian plants. 

I try to visit botanic gardens wherever we travel and have seen some beautiful ones but few have such variety as ours.  There is an alpine garden for high-altitude plants, an indoor atrium for tropical plants and the "cloud forest" tree complete with orchids, bromeliads and epiphytes.  There is a pine forest trail, a children's garden, a Southwest garden, a tall-grass prairie garden as well as small nook-gardens featuring different species of herbs, grasses and flowers.

When I want to walk somewhere, write or paint--alone or with friends--or just be quite and feel small, I go to the DBG.  What a bargain  to have such a place of respite for only $40 a year!

Precarious!

This Iris plant has bloomed every year in our alley.

Nobody in the neighborhood knows who planted it or when.  We've lived in our house for 34 years and it has bloomed every year.  The woman whose garage that was, had lived in her house for 15-20 years before we moved in and she didn't plant it.  Someone had thought to beautify  this utilitarian passage with a little color.  The rest of the plants are a combination of ground cover and weeds but this iris makes me smile every year.

Yesterday I took this picture, along with the close-up below.

Alley Iris Close-up

During the afternoon our daughter-in-law called with a small emergency with the garage door of the house they had just moved into the day before.  My son was unable to go home so we went to help.  We stayed for dinner.  We were gone about four hours and left during a drenching thunderstorm.  When we returned home the storm had already passed our area and left in its wake a cowering Iris, water still dripping from its leaves.

A humbled Iris

The weather bureau said this storm was the worst in 50 years.  Two people died in the flash floods caused by this storm, one a small child in a stroller that was swept by the sudden  current in an underpass where the mother had run for shelter from heavy hail stones. In light of that it is definitely inappropriate to be sad over an Iris, so I'll just prop it up, enjoy it while it lasts then wait until it blooms again next year.

Big Bugs!

Large wooden ants are part of the"Big Bugs" Exhibit.

Each of the last 3 summers the Denver Botanic Gardens has sponsored special exhibits of garden art.  This year it is Big Bugs.  There are spiders, praying mantis, ladybugs, dragonflies and grasshoppers.  I've chosen just a few of my favorites.

Wooden ladybug with polished circle "spots"

Grasshopper in the still-brown prairie grasses.

A Pride for two brothers!

These two brothers are Co-Kings of the Denver Zoo Pride.

According to experienced feline zoo keepers, it is not unusual for brothers to share a pride while a lion stranger moving in would be the cause of a fight to the death with the victor winning the entire pride of lionesses. These two seemed quite comfortable with their shared position--and the pride is growing.  This year alone we've gained 5 cubs.

As with all wild animals born in captivity, their genetic history is carefully recorded by the American Association of Zoos and Aquariums and if any animal's genes become over-represented in the total captive gene-pool, the animal is either vasectomized or norplanted depending on the gender.    We once had a sign in our zoo that read, "computer Dating--Your zoo or mine?"  Apparently some parents did not like this explanation of the Species Survival Plan so the sign was retired, though thankfully the plan survives. 

Our zoo frequently receives "animals on loan" from other zoos for the purpose of infusing our captive  populations with genetic variety.  It certainly beats capturing them from the wild.  Unfortunately animals are still confiscated from poachers, and if, for some reason, it is not possible to return them to the wild, they become another source of gene variance.

I do so love the big cats and I support whatever can be done to insure they will not become extinct on the planet.

Zoo, through a child's eyes!

Gold Crown Cranes at the Denver Zoo

In January I had renewed my zoo membership because by renewing early I saved $10. Somehow my card never arrived in the mail so I stopped by to check on it.  I took my camera with me as we were going to take Clio after we picked her up at day care and I didn't want to take my camera then.  It's too tempting to try to catch the animals in different poses and I wanted to spend quality time with Clio and answer her questions.

The cranes above are always busy and usually too near the glass-fence to get anything but a shot over the fence looking down at the top of their heads.  Today I got not only one but both of them at a sufficient distance to catch the quirkiness of these gorgeous birds.

It was 4:00 p.m. when we arrived at the zoo, but since summer hours are in effect we could stay until 6:00.  We asked Clio what animals she wanted to see and were surprised when she said, "snakes."  We first looked at the python then went into Tropical Discovery where they house both ground and tree snakes.  She loved the designs of the snakes and the tiny bright-colored tropical frogs became her new favorites.

I always love the zoo but seeing it through the eyes of an almost 3-year-old is a special treat.  We were walking along hoof stock highway when she spied--a good city block away--what she called the "ceracal".  It had been a long time since we'd been there and I was surprised she got the name that close.  I said, "Do you want to ride the carousel?"  Of course the answer was yes.  We arrived in time for the last ride of the day and it was just the 3 of us so she could choose from among all the zoo animals.  She narrowed her options to the Okapi, the Cheetah or the Zebra.  The Zebra won.