Last fall, I planted bulbs in the front planter and a small patch of the back garden. I drew a map so I’d know what they were when they started to grow, and I know I put it someplace clever where it’d be easy to find…

The bulbs are starting to sprout. A few in the front, a few in the back. I’m starting to believe winter might end someday.

Monarch on thistle (Meadowbrook Park). Butterflies rarely hold still for me, so I’m happy this turned out.

Spider vs dragonfly (Busey Woods). This is a yellow and black garden spider. We came by the web shortly after the dragonfly was caught, so got to see most of the struggle. There were quite a few of these spiders at one spot along the path.

Sephski, this is for you. (Meadowbrook Park, where there is a lot of sculpture, most of it less identifiable)

Two weeks ago, J and I helped clear bush honeysuckle at Weaver Park, which is a relatively recent purchase by the city of Urbana. They plan to put ball and soccer fields there; people also want to preserve the 7 or 8 oak trees (red, white, and chinkapin) that are 300-400 years old. It’s neat to get in at the start of a project like that.

Yesterday, I went to Meadowbrook Park to collect seeds, which the park district uses there and at other parks (including Weaver) and sells. We had about a dozen plants we could have collected from, but most of us focused on one or two because it’s not easy to learn to id plants by seed head, especially when the leaves have already fallen off.

The prairie is larger than you might think given the line of trees; it extends quite a bit off the left of the picture.

More photos behind the cut; click for larger versions.

Some kind of coreopsis. There wasn’t a lot of it so it was hard to get a good enough view to identify it. Plus they all look the same… But it was nice to see some color among all the white flowers.

Pale Beardstongue. These are the white flowers you see in the previous two photos. Easy to get close enough to see, hard to hold still enough to photograph.

Ohio Spiderwort. My favorite of Sunday’s plants. It’s hard to tell in this photo, but it’s very spiky. Also, it has a cool name.

I remain rather unsuccessful at bird photos (sorry, Mom and Dad). Mostly red wing blackbirds anyway.

One of my tomatoes is very orange, and my lettuce seems to have stopped dying. Soon I can have a very tiny homegrown salad. Quite exciting.

Links:

• llygoden has resurrected the iwrislomo community, now available for goalsetting and commiserating at your very own choice of writing pace.
• irysangel sold two books, Sex Starved and its sequel.

Thursday I had my volunteer interview at the park and learned about all the very cool things I can do. Saturday I have my first volunteer stint at the nature center (on a weekend, yikes); I also have a butterfly survey to sign up for. They’re also going to put me in touch with the people who monitor which wildflowers are blooming, which is very different than what I did before (counting populations of rare species), and will require me to actually learn my plants.

The fun part about posting these so long after I took them was re-identifying all the plants, although I remembered them all except for the toothwort.

	Dutchman’s breeches So-named because they look like a pair of trousers.
	Trout lily – yellow It was tricky to get the camera close to the plant while not casting a shadow or stepping on other plants…

The rest of the photos (10 total) are in the Highbanks Apr 22 2007 gallery.

I’ve applied (it’s a much more involved process here than in Toledo) to monitor rare plants in the park system again, and I’m looking forward to that. This time I can take photos. With luck (and practice) I’ll get better at them.

Also saw a bluebird, a red-headed woodpecker, and an oriole. Heard lots of orioles, too. I had to ask the naturalist what the orange bird with dark wings I’d seen was, because I really don’t know much about birds. My parents will laugh.

Saw a bird, possibly a towhee, an unidentified butterfly, an ebony jewelwing damselfly, and something else that I’ve forgotten. The trail I took went through an EFP-land forest, with widely spaced trees and little undergrowth, though parts of it had lots of ferns to hide fallen logs and rabbit holes from unsuspecting heroes. After a slippery climb up a sandy hill, the trail emerged onto sand dunes, sunny and hot while the forest had been cool and smelling of mildew. I preferred the dunes.