I live a stone's throw from Delaware. Delaware is green. Very green. The DuPont family that settled much of this area has certainly left its horticultural mark, and their descendants continue to beautify this area to this day.
I didn't grow up around here. I grew up in western Maryland, in a valley nestled between two ridges of the Appalachian Mountains. While I appreciate a beautiful formal garden, it's the scenery of a hilly mountain walk that really makes my heart sing. Give me an outcropping of limestone with ferns all around and a stream winding down the hillside and I'm one happy camper.
Although I had ready access to the hills, I did, as I said, live down in the valley. I lived on the outskirts of a small city. We weren't farmers, but some of our neighbors were. The last home I lived in with my parents (They are still there), was high on a hill with a meadow below and the Antietam Creek beyond the meadow. The neighborhoods I lived in were green, too. But a different sort of green than those I see around here.
You see, the lawns around here are Weed & Feed lawns. They are very, very green. They are uniform and neatly trimmed, and never, ever shaggy. And they never, ever have any dandelions.
Now, I like dandelions in their proper place. I don't want them in my flower gardens, because after the pretty flower goes away (Admit it; they are pretty.), the leaves get tall and gangly and the tap root goes down about sixty feet and you have to pull out the heavy chemical artillery to get rid of them. Dandelions in the lawn, however, are wonderful. The mower keeps the leaves trimmed and tender for year round bunny rabbit consumption. (There are no bunnies on Weed & Feed lawns.) And when they are in bloom, the lawn is sprinkled with jewels of sunny yellow.
It's all a matter of perspective and taste, I suppose. Just where does one draw that line between wilderness on the one hand and manicured formality on the other? Each has its place, but in my yard, we keep the line a bit closer to the wilderness end of the scale than do our neighbors. Sure, we mow the lawn. Part of it, anyway. We have some flower beds and we try to keep them weeded. But the wooded areas are left the way God planted them. Dead trees are allowed to stand, as long as they don't endanger the house. After all, some of our neighbors are woodpeckers and squirrels. The stream banks are cleared of prickly things, but the rest of the natural vegetation has not been replaced with their hybridized cousins. The frogs like it better that way.
Most important, we never, ever Weed & Feed. Today, I took a walk over our little two-acre patch with dogs at my side and a camera around my neck and reaped some of the springtime rewards of our lawn care negligence.
I don't know what this little flower is. It grows in a patch in the shade at the edge of a wood. It is a tiny thing that you might easily walk by, but if you stoop down and take a closer look, you can see its beautiful pink details in the petals. Each little blossom closes up at night and it takes at least until noon to fully open up. Be sure to click on this one so you can see the bright pink anthers on the full-sized shot.
This is a fairly tall wildflower that is growing in the woods. It is so bright white, that you can see it from quite a distance. The flowers remind me of phlox, but the leaves are quite different.
Moss and ferns remind me of those mountain walks.
Well, okay, I planted these here. I couldn't resist sharing a shot of the bleeding hearts, though.
When you walk up to the stream, you hear plop, plop, plop as the panicking frogs leave their resting places and escape into the water. When a tree fell over the stream, we left in place the portion of the trunk that bridged the stream. The dogs use it as a bridge. I don't know a person surefooted enough to follow them while walking upright, but kids sometimes cross it on all fours.
My springtime favorite, though, has to be the wild violets. We have zillions of them with a wide variety of colors, from the purest white to the deepest purple and everything in between.
So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Matthew 6:28-30
My live in botanist says the second wildflower after the dandelion is Spring Beauty and the third is Spring Cress, FYI. Great pics!
JD
Posted by: JD Wetterling | April 29, 2005 at 07:54 PM
Dory, thank you for that lovely walk in your woods! I could almost hear the stream and smell the dampness in the mossy ferny parts. Your pictures or so vivid.
You know what's out in our walks here -- wild bleeding heart! They aren't so bright as the bicolor pink/white planted kind, but solid pink. And we have lots of other things like tiny pink flowers growing close to the forest floor, and bladderwort in the boggy parts, all manner of blossoms (today I saw a horse chestnut in bloom), and of course dandelions.
Posted by: violet | April 29, 2005 at 10:13 PM
JD, My husband and I were saying, after I wrote that post, that surely someone will know the names of those flowers and I would finally get to know what they are. So thank Mrs. JD for me!
By the way folks, for some beautiful wildflower pictures (far superior to my amateur shots) follow the link on JD's site for the Wildflowers of Ridge Haven and see Mrs. JDW's photography.
Posted by: Dory | April 29, 2005 at 10:39 PM
Beautiful. Simply beautiful.
Thank you.
Jen
Posted by: Jen | April 29, 2005 at 11:58 PM
Amen, Dory. We live in a weed and feed neighborhood, but we love dandelions. My wife and I were discussing the other day why people hate them so much in their lawns. They're pretty when they're yellow and when they're white.
The houses on our street also border a large woods in the back. We let our dead trees stand, too, and we let the dead logs rot. Once , after we first moved to this place, I saw a fire back in the woods. When I went to investigate, a neighbor on the other side was burning pine logs. He didn't want to put them in his fireplace, but he didn't want to leave them in the woods, either. "I never knew how much effort it is to maintain woods," he said.
"Well, I tell you how much effort it is to maintain my side of the woods," I said. "None." I was afraid I might have to eat those words, especially after the pine beetles killed the white pines. We're now about to move, after 10 years here, and so far I've kept my word--much to the pleasure of all creatures involved (with the possible exception of the guy on the other side of the woods). Peace.
Posted by: Milton Stanley | May 01, 2005 at 08:29 AM
BTW, as much as we like danelions, we don't have them in our yard, probably because the seeds can't get here with the neighbors fighting them off so hard. We do enjoy them, but not enough to import seeds, I suppose.
Posted by: Milton Stanley | May 01, 2005 at 08:30 AM
This post is enchanting! I walked beside you, and with the dog (even trying to walk the log). Before we retired here on Fripp Island, we lived on a small horse farm in Aiken, SC, where I let the dandelions grow free in our front yard. The horses loved it when we'd bring them out to eat them. And so it was I realized one day that God created them for us not only to gaze at but to eat. Try some fresh leaves in your salad, some crushed and dried ones in your butter. Nice.
Posted by: Joy | May 01, 2005 at 08:54 AM
I really enjoyed the walk through your yard, Dori. It brought a relaxing peace at the end of a very busy Sunday. Being a partner to a Pastor is the best job in the world...and a walk on the wildflower side helps to remind me not to take myself too seriously...it's the LORD's garden, not mine.
Posted by: Kathlen Dalton | May 01, 2005 at 10:51 PM
Violet,
I used to find those wild bleeding hearts in the woods along the creek at my parents' house. They're gorgeous! White Dutchman's Britches, too, and the beautiful bluebells. What an Artist our God is, eh?
Posted by: Dory | May 02, 2005 at 05:40 PM
Enjoyed this so linked to it at my blog.
Posted by: James Lopez | May 03, 2005 at 09:37 PM
The unwelcome winter and spring rains came … and stayed … and stayed. Dory and I, at opposite ends of the country, complained about rooting out this year’s rain fed, bumper crop, multi-varietal weeds, identifiable only with a garden encyclopedia (she is really speaking of weeds of a different kind). But, California farmers celebrated as reservoirs and the underground water supplies began reaching or exceeding normal levels, while other Californians watched their homes, and part of the state, ungracefully slide into the Pacific Ocean.
For those of us with ordinary homes on ordinary lots, the rains bring only wet foot prints on linoleum floors through the kitchen, at worst -- and maybe having to place a towel against a not so snugly fitting door. We dry-climate Californians have difficulty adjusting to rain. When it begins falling to settle the summer and fall dust, we’re not sure what it is – somebody forgot to turn off the sprinklers! You should see us during the first rains of September -- it’s like watching demolition derby on the freeways.
But the upside results of this year’s downpour is the spectacular, unmatched beauty of the state, from north to south. The southern deserts are ablaze with wildflowers; and normally barren foothills, which cover much of our state, are a palette of colors -- mostly whites, yellows, orange, blues, and lots of green – poppies, lupines, larkspurs, and lots more. In the coastal forests, ferns and trillium are lush and green. And the waterfalls of Yosemite are glorious beyond words.
There is another bonus with this record rainfall – mushrooms – maybe not quite as good as the fall varieties; but wonderful signs of life, nevertheless -- and a treat for even the most discriminating gourmet. My mother used to gather the fungus from fallen, rotting trees – sautéing them in a cast iron skillet with green onion, soy sauce, and a little sugar – served with gohan (rice) – I remember the taste and texture as a little bit of heaven here on earth.
Posted by: shokenjii | May 23, 2005 at 08:33 PM