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Author Topic: Alberta Wanderings 09  (Read 12136 times)

cohan

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Alberta Wanderings 09
« on: May 11, 2009, 07:02:22 PM »
much of the same ground covered in  last year's shots..
a few more petasites for Robin....
i think these are all
Petasites Sagittatus
which has prettier flowers than the other species here..
the first couple are on my property, the rest of these are on my uncle's farm which is connected to my acreage..just 2-3 minutes walk from my house
the ones on my place surprised me: growing on a mound of soil pushed up (many years ago) when the sewage lagoon was dug...it is surrounded by wettish areas, but the plants are growing right on top of the mound, which cant be wet....

Gerdk

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #1 on: May 11, 2009, 07:18:40 PM »
Cohan, Thank you for this early spring impressions!
Especially the last photo  reminds me of landscape art.

Gerd
Gerd Knoche, Solingen
Germany

cohan

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #2 on: May 12, 2009, 06:33:44 AM »
Cohan, Thank you for this early spring impressions!
Especially the last photo  reminds me of landscape art.
Gerd

thanks gerd :)
 i take many photos, and there are lots of portraits of plants and flowers, also i think its very interesting to see some overviews of where the plants are growing, even when the shots aren't artistic ;) but the landscapes (and skyscapes!) which i take for purely aesthetic (vs informative) reasons, are probably even greater in number :)
as a painter also, i am very interested in shapes, patterns, textures, and above all light and contrast!

Ragged Robin

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #3 on: May 12, 2009, 07:37:48 AM »
much of the same ground covered in  last year's shots..
a few more petasites for Robin....
i think these are all
Petasites Sagittatus
which has prettier flowers than the other species here..
the first couple are on my property, the rest of these are on my uncle's farm which is connected to my acreage..just 2-3 minutes walk from my house
the ones on my place surprised me: growing on a mound of soil pushed up (many years ago) when the sewage lagoon was dug...it is surrounded by wettish areas, but the plants are growing right on top of the mound, which cant be wet....
Thanks for posting the Petasites in your homeland and I love your dramatic sky meets landscapes.....what kind of medium do you paint in Cohan?
Valais, Switzerland - 1,200 metres - Continental climate - rocks and moraine

cohan

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #4 on: May 13, 2009, 08:03:59 AM »
tks, robin--over the years i have worked most in a combination of powdered tempera pigments with acrylic medium, then in more recent years (not so recent now..) watercolours, and more recently still, coloured pencil and oil pastel, etc...
havent done much at all of late, and trying to get organised to do more again...

Ragged Robin

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #5 on: May 13, 2009, 09:43:20 AM »
tks, robin--over the years i have worked most in a combination of powdered tempera pigments with acrylic medium, then in more recent years (not so recent now..) watercolours, and more recently still, coloured pencil and oil pastel, etc...
havent done much at all of late, and trying to get organised to do more again...

Sounds a challenging range of media - all so different - would love to see some of your work if and when you feel you would like to show it. Interpretation of a scene/subject is so personal and it would be great, for instance, to see one of your photos that inspired you to paint  :)
Valais, Switzerland - 1,200 metres - Continental climate - rocks and moraine

cohan

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #6 on: May 13, 2009, 08:20:11 PM »
tks, robin, i'll try to dig up something that i have scanned.... i actually have barely started on landscapes, so not much to show there, though thats an area i want to experiment with; in the past have done more people/portraits, and a series of succulent plant close-ups a couple years ago, etc...
guess that will be offlist...

Hristo

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #7 on: May 15, 2009, 07:26:40 PM »
Hi Cohan,
Great so see pics from your area of Canada, it all looks very early on in the season for you, what are your daytime temps like in May?
Hristo passed away, after a long illness, on 11th November 2018. His support of SRGC was  much appreciated.

cohan

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #8 on: May 16, 2009, 08:01:42 AM »
Hi Cohan,
Great so see pics from your area of Canada, it all looks very early on in the season for you, what are your daytime temps like in May?

tks, chris--yes, it is early for us, anyway--in gardens (even more so in towns and cities) there could be early things flowering (we should probably be at least a few weeks behind lori, generally), but the natives are very cautious--even though we could have nice weather for many weeks by now, the natives know that there are likely to be some cold snaps through may!
'normal' for now is a high of 17C and a low of 4C, and we have had some temps above 20C already weeks ago, but overall its been a cool spring; we had higher than normal snowfall, which lasted longer than normal : the same day i was taking those pics, i saw a small snowbank in a shady area, where there must have been a deep drift--that is quite unusual!

the last several days have been mostly below 10C; next couple days supposed to hit 19-20, but then a high of 4 on monday, with possible snow! not at all unusual to get the odd snow up to end of may, though usually its nice between!

aspens are showing some green in some areas, and if we had some warm days, they'd burst out very quickly..

Hristo

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #9 on: May 17, 2009, 05:52:04 AM »
Cheers Cohan, your spring weather really does fluctuate then!
Hristo passed away, after a long illness, on 11th November 2018. His support of SRGC was  much appreciated.

cohan

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #10 on: May 17, 2009, 08:03:50 AM »
Cheers Cohan, your spring weather really does fluctuate then!

sometimes more than others! this is nothing for the record books, probably, but nor is it exactly 'typical'- today was around 21C, tomorrow 20, and monday now -1C!!
perhaps the best comparison is to a relatively high altitude, (we are on a more or less level area, prob btwn 900-980m--i dont know exactly, but those are towns in each direction..) because we dont get really stable air masses built up for long, usually--even on hot summer days, a thunder storm can drop the temperature from 30C to 10 or 15 in a very short time;likewise, there is also commonly a significant drop at night-and single digit night temperatures in midsummer are not rare..

Hristo

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #11 on: May 17, 2009, 09:21:21 AM »
Sorry but your weather sounds like it's 'Manic - Depressive'! I imagine the night time temps in particular could limit the species you otherwise might grow given the higher day time temps?
Hristo passed away, after a long illness, on 11th November 2018. His support of SRGC was  much appreciated.

cohan

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #12 on: May 17, 2009, 08:58:54 PM »
Sorry but your weather sounds like it's 'Manic - Depressive'! I imagine the night time temps in particular could limit the species you otherwise might grow given the higher day time temps?

time will tell! lori is the closest grower i know of personally, and she is a couple hours away and different climate in several respects--so its all by guess and by golly ;) i'm not too worried, as i know many many things will grow well here--certainly, natives alone (if i could get them!!-besides locals) already provide a large variety, many of which are little grown... and i have high hopes for many high altitude species which likely are used to chilly nights :)

what i DONT  intend to try here is the popular summering outdoors of very tender plants, such as the cacti and succulents i grow indoors--no point, season is too short and unreliable to bother acclimating for a few weeks...lol

now i'm out to get a few veg seeds in the ground before the snow forecast for tonight and tomorrow!

cohan

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #13 on: May 18, 2009, 06:21:07 AM »
to finish out the shots from that mother's day walk (may 10)
first, some mossy shots for robin...
sorry, no idea on names...

cohan

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Re: Alberta Wanderings 09
« Reply #14 on: May 18, 2009, 06:46:26 AM »
final set for may 10..
our local cory
Corydalis aurea
a biennial, which is widespread, but not common or abundant locally; here, it seems to favour disturbed areas, in particular mounds of loose soil thrown up by the pocket gopher; i havent seen if along fields or roadsides,that i recall (doesnt mean it doesnt happen)..but despite being in widely scattered locations, they seem so able to find those gopher piles, it makes me wonder if there is some other connection to that species??
i went to look for them in a set of mounds where i saw them last year--the overwintering first year clumps, though tiny, are  conspicuous in early spring when there is little green..
what a difference a year makes! the gopher piles--bare last year, mostly, were almost impossible to find with a year's growth of grass and weeds (this is in a semi natural forest edge area, but is also home to cattle, so there are forage weeds also)..in any case, i could find no corys there--i guess since they bloomed last year, those plants are dead, and new seedlings have not yet appeared, if its not too overgrown for them to do so.... luckily, a little farther on, i found one plant, still at the forest edge, still in a gopher mound... this year i really will find some little plants to try transplanting, and get some seeds later on as well!

behind the corys, a strip of forest, then what used to be a hayfield, now just grazed, but a favourite area with the small herd of cows, its grazed very closely, unlike much of the old bush/pasture which is much more overgrown than when i was a kid...
this tightly grazed land is good habitat for
Antennaria
we have several species, which i haven't sorted out yet--small, larger, very white, more green..in this field there are both white and pink flowered forms/species, plus a couple of different sizes..
flowering is later; this view just shows how they cohabit with grass and weeds (oh--its the little whitish rosettes...hiding amongst the grasses and dandelions), some areas really dense patches, other areas more loosely spread..this view covers a few feet...
Ribes
early leaves

 


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