I lurve bell hyacinths. And you caught that fly in action!
I’m a little jealous of the variety of blooming things in your near vicinity, though. Consider me pouting right now (esp. low on insect life right now, but I was out in the garden yesterday and ants and bright red mites are everywhere -- also saw my first spring butterfly and also a tiny bird that looked a lot like a robin for the first time ever).
Ice Swimmersays
The dog-furry bee fly at work on Muscari.
The soft focus in the last is dreamy. Works really well.
kestrelsays
Does anyone know the name of the flowers in #4? I have those too but don’t know the name. My neighbors all know a great deal about cows (or are actually cows) but don’t know much about flowers so it’s no good asking them.
The hyacinths are so beautiful!
rqsays
kestrel
I’ve been calling them wild hyacinths because the general shape and colouring remind me of that (we have them here, too!), but I think it’s actually glory-of-the-snow. They’re lovely.
rqsays
Also I just found out a lot more about the local names for a string of spring flowers -- it turns out I’ve been calling most of them wrong. :D
rq
The German name is “star hyacinth”, so you weren’t that far off. Which I found out by clicking on “German” in your Wikipedia link. They’re among the “came with the house” flowers and I’m generally not knowledgeable in these matters.
I’m a little jealous of the variety of blooming things in your near vicinity, though
Well, I don’t get to have an ice rink in winter…
But in general I like my geographic location: far enough north to get some occasional snow (at least before we broke the climate) and not far enough south to fry crisp in summer.
rqsays
Giliell
I’m sure glad the Romans went and systematized these things with Latin names, otherwise we’d never understand who’s talking about which bird or flower!
(I mean, it turns out these are lilies and these are amaryllis; I’d always sort of assumed they were in the same family or something. And the ‘star hyacinth’ (keeping that name, it’s lovely) doesn’t seem to grow locally at all, according to that database -- but if it did grow and if one were to call it something, it would go by the various names of sniedzīte (“little snow”), zilpulkstenīte (“little blue clock”) or zilsniedzīte (“little blue snow”); two of those names can also be applied to the Blaustern, which can also be white… :D)
kestrelsays
Thank you so much, rq! Yes, I believe you are right, that is what this is. I just pulled off a blossom and checked it out under magnification to see the flattened structures that form the “cup” in the middle of the flower. And what a great name -- they are among the earliest bulbs to flower in my garden.
rqsays
(Re: my 7, it turns out they’re not lilies but asparagus now. And glory-of-the-snow apparently is also a Scilla according to some classifications. The snowdrop seems to be safe as an amaryllis.)
I lurve bell hyacinths. And you caught that fly in action!
I’m a little jealous of the variety of blooming things in your near vicinity, though. Consider me pouting right now (esp. low on insect life right now, but I was out in the garden yesterday and ants and bright red mites are everywhere -- also saw my first spring butterfly and also a tiny bird that looked a lot like a robin for the first time ever).
The dog-furry bee fly at work on Muscari.
The soft focus in the last is dreamy. Works really well.
Does anyone know the name of the flowers in #4? I have those too but don’t know the name. My neighbors all know a great deal about cows (or are actually cows) but don’t know much about flowers so it’s no good asking them.
The hyacinths are so beautiful!
kestrel
I’ve been calling them wild hyacinths because the general shape and colouring remind me of that (we have them here, too!), but I think it’s actually glory-of-the-snow. They’re lovely.
Also I just found out a lot more about the local names for a string of spring flowers -- it turns out I’ve been calling most of them wrong. :D
rq
The German name is “star hyacinth”, so you weren’t that far off. Which I found out by clicking on “German” in your Wikipedia link. They’re among the “came with the house” flowers and I’m generally not knowledgeable in these matters.
Well, I don’t get to have an ice rink in winter…
But in general I like my geographic location: far enough north to get some occasional snow (at least before we broke the climate) and not far enough south to fry crisp in summer.
Giliell
I’m sure glad the Romans went and systematized these things with Latin names, otherwise we’d never understand who’s talking about which bird or flower!
(I mean, it turns out these are lilies and these are amaryllis; I’d always sort of assumed they were in the same family or something. And the ‘star hyacinth’ (keeping that name, it’s lovely) doesn’t seem to grow locally at all, according to that database -- but if it did grow and if one were to call it something, it would go by the various names of sniedzīte (“little snow”), zilpulkstenīte (“little blue clock”) or zilsniedzīte (“little blue snow”); two of those names can also be applied to the Blaustern, which can also be white… :D)
Thank you so much, rq! Yes, I believe you are right, that is what this is. I just pulled off a blossom and checked it out under magnification to see the flattened structures that form the “cup” in the middle of the flower. And what a great name -- they are among the earliest bulbs to flower in my garden.
(Re: my 7, it turns out they’re not lilies but asparagus now. And glory-of-the-snow apparently is also a Scilla according to some classifications. The snowdrop seems to be safe as an amaryllis.)