Today's walk report: Mental Medication

Mental medication
Music's conversation...

A sort of theme there for this weekend. No news, no hints of news, just music, conversation and one other thing... Baseball! And I need to speed though this post because the Dodgers v Giants is on in 20 minutes!

Pictures from today's walk.

Docken called in when I was taking my first pictures once again. Such good timing. Thank you, Docky. On June 1st I took some wide shots of these Oenothera lindheimeri plants and I was kinda bummed that I didn't have my close-up lens in tow. Well, today I did.

Walking across the thick woody mulch I pulled this. This is probably a Washingtonia filifera, the desert fan palm, or California palm. These palms have never prolifically self-seeded and propagated here like they have in the past, gonna say, 12-15 years. I grew up here, I never saw these popping up everywhere. Right now, I could probably dig up dozens of seedlings in my backyard alone. And I will have to do so come fall when I cut stuff back. Dreadful tree. Rats love them. I blame climate change and a local move toward weather which is more tropical. I plan to do a post about how severe this is in the near future. Or not.

Common sunflowers.

California poppy. This is how they grow here at home in the off-season. Small flowers will show up at odd times.

Monarch butterfly on narrow-leaf milkweed.

Are the apples coming closer to being edible. We shall see, I swiped one. Many are dropping on the ground.

Coreopsis.

Bauhinia × blakeana. Spot the ant? Second shot.

Canna lily.

Limonium perezii. Note the spider web activity.

I moved out of the southwestern horticulture portion of the campus and headed toward the botanical garden and beyond to get a walk in.

Various palo verde trees (Parkinsonia florida) along the way.

 Shoot! I was going to sign up for this. I totally spaced.

Tipuana tipu, or, Tipu tree. This is inside of an enclosed area or I would've attempted close-ups of the flowers. It's a huge canopy, especially relative to the height of the tree.

Dietes grandiflora.

Myrtus communis.

 
The ancient car worshipers were out in force. That term applies (generally) to both the cars and the worshipers. The first car is a 2005 Ford GT. I suspect the roadster is a replica.

Do you think this guy ever gets pulled over, for... oh, I don't know.

Lastly, heading back to my car, which is also relatively old as am I, this picture is for Trey. Sorry, no berries right now. Lantana camara.

Late for the ballgame. Thanks for stopping by. 

Today's walk report: The Story in My Eyes

 Out and about with the temperature a pleasant 66º F. Docken called in when I was taking my first photo for a walk and talk. Thank you, Docken.

Here's that first image. There are obviously three flowers on this Echinopsis oxygona but the entire unit had a chicken wire cage around it and with a 70-300 mm lens I was having trouble with the framing... if I could only "go-go gadget" with my legs, or implement the helicopter hat for that matter.

Instead I had to use a close up lens and hope for the best.

Lots of western fence lizards were zipping about. This one hanging out on a lava rock was most patient with me.

Last week I posted a dragonfly perched upon this very large Vitex agnus castus shrub but I neglected to show the beautiful flowering spires.

Pseudognaphalium californicum. AKA, California cudweed. I know this is not a plant that was intended to participate in this botanical garden. I don't believe the garden has a curator anymore. That's really sad. I've been visiting this garden for about 15 years now and it was weed-free (not to be confused with free weed) and now there are several weeds that are prodigious propagators.

Hummingbirds were flying at a dizzying pace, mostly where sunlight was directly in my face. I barely even tried. This is a female Calypte anna. The two males I'm accustomed to were both AWOL but my garden visit was also brief.

On my way out of the garden, another fence lizard sitting still for a moment.

Onto the walk. It was the same route I engaged in last weekend for the most part. It's 2.1 miles, give or take.

A young ground squirrel and a manhole cover from India. It's kind of amazing to me that a 200+ lb manhole cover can be made so much cheaper in India that they can also be shipped from India and then shipped again to destinations unknown. Some are apparently made at a foundry in Michigan but I've never seen one displaying that.

House finches (Haemorhous mexicanus).

Tecoma stans, orange jubilee. I took some seeds from one of these last year (?) and tried to germinate a few but failed. I'm not sure what went wrong because I've germinated some Tecoma stans, yellow bells from a shrub on the side of my garage before and it went quite smoothly. In fact, I have one plant that currently stands about 7' tall. I suspect the orange jubilee is cultivated and would be recessive in a seed. I'll try again soon.

 The campus has the orange jubilee and Yellow bells alternating along this one stretch of road.

Also in that mix are quite a few Nerium oleander. I find the smell alone of oleander toxic. I tried to find out just how toxic the Nerium oleander plant is in a brief cursory Google search and found one reputable medical site say one leaf could kill an adult person, while the National Library of Medicine stated 5-15 leaves. All parts of the plant are poisonous, especially the leaves, stem, seeds, and root. As a kid we had several oleander bushes bordering both sides of the house. I was afraid of the oleander plant. There's a lot of very pretty stuff on planet earth that can kill you, so, watch it!

Goats. There are lots of goats on this campus. As a youngster I once milked a goat, well partially milked a goat less than 300 yards from where these guys are standing. I, at least, got the handle of it. I also got squirted with goat's milk by my “supervisor.”

This goat was just to the right of those goats and I'd swear it was looking at me like, aren't you gonna take my picture? So I did.

Albizia julibrissin, the Persian silk tree, pink silk tree, or mimosa tree. I really like these trees. The only problem I see is this, wherever I have seen mimosa trees, I inevitably see lots of baby mimosa trees sprouting near and sometimes not so near.

This was odd. Too me this was so odd that I almost talked myself out of it. This is a common raven on the left and a young turkey vulture on the right. I can't find any real definitive information regarding their desire or lack thereof to coexist peacefully. However, I would surmise that ravens, being as smart as they are, might appreciate the turkey vulture's ability to locate carrion.

Jacaranda in bloom everywhere.

Back to these guys... some of the pictures I lost last week. Problem is the reflections, the glare and the filthy windows make getting a photo very difficult.

I drove to the top of the hill and had I seen any birds of interest or anything else to take pictures of I would have gotten out of the car and added at least another 1/2 mile to my walk but I didn't. Also, while it was still pleasantly comfortable at 72º, it was summer smoggy. When you can barely see the hillsides at the perimeter of this valley exerting yourself becomes questionable.

Thanks for coming along.