Although I’ll have to admit that I was originally drawn to the showiness of this Camas Plant flower:
At the end of shoot I had fallen in love with this much simpler shot of the Camas Flower about to blossom:
Which led me to this
fascinating article about the importance of the Camas plant to the Columbia River Indians, which, in turn, makes the picture even more exquisite.
If you live in Tacoma, or nearby, for that matter, and haven’t visited the Rhododendron Garden at Pt Defiance, you’re missing a real treat. Although some of the early-season rhodies are already beginning to fade and some of the late-season plants haven’t started to bloom yet, the majority of the rhodies are now in full bloom.
If you’ve visited in the past, you’re in for an even bigger treat than before, because the garden was rededicated this year and a number of changes have been made. Here’s a new rhodie named after the park:
and a subtle addition to the garden, signs identifying many of the rhodies. More substantial changes are evident in the piles of brush still awaiting removal. The clearing makes many of the plants easier to see, but thankfully still manages to preserve the greatest charm of this garden, seeing the rhodies in an old-growth environment.
If you’re lucky, you may even find yourself sharing the garden with a friend
like this young buck who, thankfully, seemed more interested in eating ferns than rhododendrons.
Though you can’t count on the wildlife, if you get there soon you can count on seeing this Naomi Pink Glow
this orange Medusa
and many others, that prove nature’s natural beauty transcends man’s attempts to classify or contain it:
Waiting in the wings,
stage left,
the little missus
not missing a thing.
I sometimes think what I love most about Nature is its sheer unpredictability.
I went to Belfair hoping to see Green Herons, and, although I saw one just as we started our walk, it flew away quickly as we approached. All I could do was catch this quick shot:
Truthfully, I wasn’t even sure it was a green heron until I got the picture home and put it on screen. Although we searched for it throughout our walk, we never saw it again. I’ll probably have to spend the rest of the summer trying to get a good shot of one.
Delightfully, the highlight of the walk turned out to be the swallows.
I suspect it’s impossible to get a shot of a swallow flying without resorting to a movie camera, and until Sunday I’ve never managed to get a decent shot of one as they usually seem shy. So was quite happy to get this shot of a VioletGreen Swallow perched on a nearby fence.
I assumed all the swallows diving over and under us as we walked the boardwalk were the same species, so I was a little surprised when I looked through the viewfinder and realized this was an entirely different species,
a Barn Swallow.
The best picture of the day, though, has to be this one of a Tree Swallow who posed about two feet away for a whole series of photos:
At the risk of sounding fickle, I will admit that I spent much of the walk adoring these fearless daredevils, having totally forgotten the slow-moving heron for the moment.