Tag: Square Photo Challenge

Photo Challenges – Bright Dandelion and a Wildflower Walk

On By TimelessladyIn photo challenges13 Comments

I love dandelion puffs. Backlit by the morning sun, the photo becomes naturally monochromatic. There are some interesting sparkles shining in the fluffy parachutes. The correct name for the fluff is pappus. You can find more dandelion information on Quora.

Today, I came upon a great blog called Good One God Challenge. My entry for the challenge is this beautiful dandelion. The dandelion against the sky is part of Skywatch. The square shape and the bright sunshine makes it perfect for today’s Life of B – April Squares Bright challenge entry. While not bright in color, the photo conveys a sense of brightness in the contrast.

I found the beautiful puff of dandelion on this week’s wildflower walk. These bright and beautiful wildflowers are blooming now in my Mid-Atlantic state of New Jersey. (Do squares in a square count as a bright square? I’ll have to ask Becky.)

Top to bottom, left to right, the wildflower names are:

1. Ground Ivy (Glechoma hederacea) – An invasive groundcover in the mint family.

2. Speedwell Persian (Veronica-persicaiolet) – Very small flowers, but they capture the color of the sky. It’s everywhere at this time of year in NJ, but soon disappears when hot weather arrives.

3. Lesser Celandine (Ranunculus ficaria) – This plant is invasive, but it also has the beautiful yellow petals of buttercups, and is in the buttercup family Ranunculaceae.

4 Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) – Nutritious, the plant has many benefits.

5. Purple Deadnettle (Lamium purpureum) – Although it can be invasive, it is an important wildflower for early pollinators. In this photograph you can see a Cabbage White Butterfly feeding on the small flowers.

6 White Violets (Viola blanda) – These are lovely, but like many wildflowers, can become invasive and take over your garden beds and lawn.

7. Garlic Mustard (Alliaria petiolata) – I learned this wildflower is a wild edible, but also can be invasive.

8. Periwinkle (Myrtle vinca) – Not just a wildflower, this plant is sometimes sold in garden nurseries as an evergreen groundcover.

9. Indian Strawberry (Duchesnea indica) – The small strawberries are not edible. The leaves can be used to treat eczema.

Phruit – Dragon Fruit

On By TimelessladyIn Phruit11 Comments

Today I’m taking part in the Squares Challenge/Life of B/April – Bright . I think these Dragon Fruit I recently purchased are the perfect choice for bright.

Dragon Fruit, proper name Pitaya or Pitayaha, come in two colors, a beautiful bright sunshine gold, and these amazing magenta-crimson variety. So far, after sampling both types in the past few weeks, I am a little more partial to the gold, Perhaps the red variety wasn’t quite as ripe as it should be though, so I will give it another two chances…exactly the amount of dragon fruit I still have left.

After reading the link below, I was able to conclude my Dragon Fruit was ready to eat. The fruit was bright in color and the ‘wings’ on the skin had browned a bit and started to wither.

3 Ways to Tell if a Dragon Fruit is Ripe

I took a chance when I purchased this fruit. It is very expensive. For some reason I thought they grew on trees. I was surprised to find they are a type of cactus. A piece of the stem from the cactus is visible on one end of this fruit. Would I be able to propagate it using this stem? I don’t know, perhaps I’ll give it a try. I do know I will be saving some of the seeds in an attempt to grow them into a plant. I’ll update my progress in future posts.

How to grow a Dragon fruit from fruit’s seeds.

The seeds in a Dragon Fruit are edible, much like a Kiwi. I slice the fruit in half and scoop it out with a spoon. I prefer the fruit to come to room temperature if it has been stored in the refrigerator. Delicious!