A haiku, filmed and written on April 9 north of the Reservoir in Central Park. Inspired by Lee!
The Orchid Show: Thailand at the New York Botanical Garden was stunning in the riot of color and variety of blooms. The orchids, cactuses, water plants and other blooms on display in the Haupt Conservatory this spring delighted the eyes and gave pleasure to all the other senses!
The Orchid Show: Thailand at the New York Botanical Garden, Bronx, New York
I visited the show twice, on March 12 and March 29. The video is set to a string version of Léo Delibes's "Flower Duet" from Lakme, Robert Schumann's Blumenstück, Walter Niemann's Garden of Orchids, and Frédéric Chopin's Prelude No. 3, Op. 28.
One of my friends has said that orchids aren't her favorite flowers because sometimes the resemblance to faces is a bit creepy. I don't necessarily share the creepiness view, but in looking at my photos, I do wonder why Underdog was in the middle of a flower in the Bronx!
Did Underdog visit the Orchid Show? One of the "faces" in the orchid blossoms.
I offer these photos from the show. This first grouping has many of the blooms that took my breath away.
I was so taken by the jade vines in the aquatic room. The Strongylodon macrobotrys is so sensual that I couldn't stop taking photos.
Jade vine in the aquatic room at the NYBG.
Also very intriguing were the cactuses in the conservatory. I offer photos here.
In the cactus room at the conservatory.
The Orchid Show has now closed. But as I hope you will see on my New York Botanical Garden page, this Bronx treasure chest offers so many exciting sights worth many visits. Right now you can see two great horned owlets and at least the mama owl when you first enter, and soon there should be some red-tailed hawk fledglings. Wood ducks have been known to breed there. And during the Christmas season, you can see the train show.
Some might wonder from the headline of this blog posting if I intended to write about the Yankees, who have their home opener today. For the first time in a decade, I won't be sitting in my seat at the stadium in the Bronx. I gave up my season tickets. As long as the Yankees think it is acceptable to hire a closing pitcher who was suspended for abusing a woman, I won't be giving the team very much of my money. And since the team now allows electronic resale of season tickets only through StubHub, which still hasn't paid me for a ticket I sold in August, I see no reason to buy season tickets in any number. Yes, I think some of the young players will be very exciting to watch this year, and I probably will be going to some of the games on the senior days. But without Andrew Miller, I don't see much reason to stay through a whole game.
Central Park has had visiting common loons in the past, but they are not all that frequent. The first time I saw a common loon in the park was on April 2, 2014, when a wildlife rehabilitator released a loon at the Lake. This was not the best place to release a loon, since the water is not really deep enough and there is not enough water distance for a good take off if the loon wants to fly. This particular loon struggled all day, sitting on the shore between efforts to swim and catch fish. It was exciting to see a loon as close as this one was, but very sad because we knew it was not doing that well. The loon did not make it through the night.
Common loon at the Lake, April 2, 2014
I next saw a common loon at the Reservoir in April 2015. I filmed the bird over several days. I didn't see a loon in 2016, but on March 30, 2017, I filmed another loon floating and diving on the upper east side of the Reservoir.
I have put together a video in the Filming the Feathers series showing these common loons. The music is by Claude Debussy (yes, I did use Clair de Lune, couldn't resist, but the music does fit the graceful descent of these beautiful diving birds).
These first two photos are from the sighting on March 30 of this year. I have been told there have been two loons, but I saw only this one.
These are photos of the injured loon on April 2, 2014. We were able to see the wing span of this bird, and the deep red eyes.
These photos are from the bird I followed in April 2015. The last photo is quite grainy, but we can see the loon's leg stretched out in it, so consider it an artistic anatomy lesson.
