Category Archives: Flora

Heatherwood Fall Colors #2

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Oak Leaf Hydrangea
Heatherwood Fall

Oak Leaf Hydrangeas are my favorites with their four season interest. In the spring, their dark green leafs unfurl. Summer brings out their beautiful conical flowers. Brilliant fall colors surround the faded brown blossoms in the autumn. In the winter most of the leaves drop leaving their exfoliating cinnamon-brown bark and their brown flower heads. A light dusting of snow highlights their beauty.

Heatherwood displays several Oak Leaf Hydrangeas throughout the garden, including a few in the Oak Grove.

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A Little Brightness for the Day

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Yellow Rose
Heatherwood Rose Garden

Our rose garden is still full of color. However, most of the blooms are past their prime and are a little tattered. It is hard to find a full crisp fresh rose without a few defects in the petals. So with my macros, my focus is on color, shape, and lines. I am continuing to work with creating “softness” with some of my rose images. I combined two images, one in focus, and one out of focus and blended them together to achieve the above result.

So here’s a little brightness for your day! There is always something in the world to celebrate.

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Soft

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“Soft Beauty”
Heatherwood Rose Garden

As I was photographing in our rose garden, I came across these two roses snuggled together. I remember thinking, “How soft and peaceful.” In post processing I tried to enhance that feeling.

There are so many interesting things to focus on in our Heatherwood garden. I have a difficult time really working a specific image since there are so many other distractions all around me. I tend to hop from one flower to another flower, vignette, or view constantly. When doing so, I tend to fall into a “photo-snapping” mentality and loose my contemplative creativity. I really need to work on this.

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A Walk Along a Garden Path (Part 3)

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“A New Perspective”
Heatherwood Garden

As I follow the path to the west, a new perspective opens up in front of me. My eyes leave the “bright and shiny garden” to gaze up along the hillside in front of me. I see the large homes on the ridge above. Fence lined pastures create the bucolic countryside feeling that attracts me to this area. The remnants of an apple orchard line the bottom fence. Our neighbor’s old horse is usually grazing amongst the apple trees.

The tree line path leads me first to a sloping lawn, then to the entrance to an informal path among a grove of young dogwoods and red buds. I missed their blooms this spring and look forward to a bright surprise next spring.

The meandering paths scattered throughout Heatherwood are designed to guide a visitor through the garden as well as introduce surprises at each turn. The plantings are young and will need several years to mature. My imagination is constantly at work envisioning what it will be in future years. In the meantime, I enjoy watching the little changes in what we have created and identifying items that we will need to add.

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A Walk Along a Garden Path (Part 2)

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“Peek at Bright & Shiny Garden”
Heatherwood Garden

Here I stand just starting to make my turn on the path, I catch a glimpse of Mary’s “bright and shiny garden” directly ahead. (Aside: When we started planning the garden, I asked Mary what she would like to see. She quickly said, “something bright and shiny.” So we designed a small garden of bright perennials that would bloom from spring through autumn.)

Before I make my turn to the west, I look back south where I had come from. I see the garden’s center circle with a specimen Zelkova. Over time the tree will grow covering the center pathway with its branches. It will be a great shade spot. Beyond our neighbors houses I can see the gap along the hill separating Selah from Yakima.

“Center Circle”
Heatherwood Garden

Now I finally turn westward to exit the path. Patience … see Part 3.

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First Year’s Growth

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Rock Garden and Meadow
Heatherwood Summer

Last year this area was all green grass. We broke up the solid lawn with various planting areas. The slope in the foreground was turned into a “alpine-like” rock ground patterned loosely from Ohme Gardens in Wenatchee, WA. In the flat area below, we created a small meadow area. The plantings are a little sparse now as they get accustomed to their first year in the landscape. It will take 3-5 years for the plants to mature and cover most of the ground. A big part of enjoying the new landscape will be to watch how the plants mature and adapt. This area is designed to have continuous color throughout the year.

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Purple & Pink

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“Purple & Pink”
Heatherwood Rock Garden

Our Heatherwood garden continues to change through the summer. Color is everywhere. Most of the perennials are relatively small since they were just planted this spring. Small vignettes are the best way to represent what is happening in the garden at this time.

Mary and I usually walk through the garden at least once a day and are always amazed at the beauty that is presented to us.

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Thistle by Georgia

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“Thistle Impression”
Heatherwood Meadow, Summer

It’s time to come back home and add a couple more images from our Heatherwood garden. I used to think thistles were just weeds, but we decided to plant a couple of different varieties in our meadow. This one is planted between white daisies and yellow yarrow. It provides a nice contrast in the meadow. With the hot temperatures (>100 degrees) these thistles have quickly bloomed then lost their color. To accentuate the artistic flair of the thistles, I added a little Georgia O’Keeffe impressionism to it.

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Where Are the Sheep … I Mean, Where is My Telephoto?

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Joshua Tree Grove
Joshua Tree National Park, California

We saw a majestic big horn sheep wandering around the hills in the park. However, I chose this image as a better representative of the park.

Now here’s the story behind the title of this post. One of my close friends (Mr. G.H. Ferguson) is a wildlife photographer. On this outing, he decided to travel light and carry only a 35mm wide angle lens. About 10 minutes into our hike, out popped a majestic big horn sheep on a ridge right in front of us. He looked down at his 35mm lens, looked up at me, and said aw Xyx?//. The good news was that I had my 200mm telephoto and was able to get a few good shots. Ferg, this image is for you!

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Where’s the Rain?

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Hoh Rain Forest
Olympic National Park, Washington

I haven’t had much luck finding rain in our Washington and Hawai’in rainforests. My last five trips have been in bright sunny weather in the middle of dry spells. Even though the weather has been beautiful during my visits, I have missed the solemness of the dark, rain-covered forests and vegetation. I will keep trying.

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