{"id":1336,"date":"2010-01-22T02:28:29","date_gmt":"2010-01-22T02:28:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/?p=1336"},"modified":"2010-01-22T02:38:07","modified_gmt":"2010-01-22T02:38:07","slug":"picture-this-winters-beauty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/?p=1336","title":{"rendered":"Picture This: Winter’s Beauty"},"content":{"rendered":"

httpv:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=EiTNFnaqTho<\/p>\n

My thanks to SpiritKeeper on YouTube for the above reading of Winter’s Beauty by William H. Davies.<\/p>\n

Gardens Gone Wild has a photo contest for January<\/a> with the theme of “Winter’s Beauty”. \u00a0As is usual it’s a theme that offers lots of opportunity for interpretation and selection. \u00a0The classic picture for me in wintertime is the Ice Cardinal <\/a>that I posted for the November contest. \u00a0But since this is for joy and sharing I ruled out any repeat submissions. \u00a0So we shall go prospecting for “Winter’s Beauty”.<\/p>\n

It’s always interesting to see how the world looks after a snowstorm, but sometimes the results after an ice storm are even more striking.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Japanese Maple in Ice<\/p><\/div>\n

But it may be even better when you get closer up to the plants.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Blueberry Row in Ice<\/p><\/div>\n

What’s missing from these pictures though is the spot of color that Ice Cardinal had. \u00a0So another approach is to look at these emerging Winter Aconite fighting back an ice patch.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Winter Aconite (Eranthis hyemalis) closed up for cold weather<\/p><\/div>\n

Another traditional example of Winter Beauty \u00a0is the Japanese Flowering Quince which is ready to flower at the drop of a hat. \u00a0Snow is only a minor inconvenience.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Japanese Flowering Quince (Chaenomeles japonica) in the snow<\/p><\/div>\n

But when you stop to think of it “Winter’s Beauty” isn’t just about the snow. \u00a0It’s all around you if you take time to look. \u00a0The leftover Northern Sea Oats are still there waiting to be seen against the winter sky.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Northern Sea Oats (Chasmanthium latifolium) against the winter sky<\/p><\/div>\n

So just following that lead and ignoring ice, snow, and color, I’m going to go with what is an ongoing Winter’s Beauty highlight for me. \u00a0Every morning’s trip to the mailbox takes me past a Star Magnolia that increasingly unveils the buds that will in late March open up to beautiful white flowers heralding another spring. \u00a0The buds have the soft furry texture of cat’s paws and the little gray-white hairs reflect the light dramatically. \u00a0That’s my “Winter’s Beauty”.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Star Magnolia (Magnolia stellata) bud in January<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

httpv:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=EiTNFnaqTho My thanks to SpiritKeeper on YouTube for the above reading of Winter’s Beauty by William H. Davies. Gardens Gone Wild has a photo contest for January with the theme of “Winter’s Beauty”. \u00a0As is usual it’s a theme that offers lots of opportunity for interpretation and selection. \u00a0The classic picture for me in wintertime is the Ice Cardinal that I posted for the November contest. \u00a0But since this is for joy and sharing I ruled out any repeat submissions. \u00a0So we shall go prospecting for “Winter’s Beauty”. It’s always interesting to see how the world looks after a snowstorm, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1336","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1336","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1336"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1336\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1351,"href":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1336\/revisions\/1351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/macgardens.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}