Longwood Gardens – Part II
/My favorite plants to photograph in the Longwood Gardens Conservatory are orchids, fiddleheads, and hibiscus.
The only time I used my clip-on macro lens for my phone was to attempt to capture some very tiny orchids. This was good practice for photographing native orchids which are very small in our part of North America.
Then I noticed the different kinds of slipper orchids. They are probably my favorites. There was a couple in the room with us that had been growing orchids for years and they told me that the slippers are often the easiest ones to grow…good to know if I ever get the yen to grow orchids. They warned me that the hobby can be addictive.
Another bit of orchid-lore from them: some orchids have a butterfly mark in their center!
Fiddleheads are always fascinating to look at closely. They are always spirals – sometimes spirals within spirals - that will eventually unfurl into the fronds of ferns. Often there is a fuzz covering the spirals that will be green – maybe shiny – when they are totally unfurled. The fuzz in white
Or brown (tree ferns). I am always surprised at how large the primitive plants can be – realized that earlier in earth’s history, ferns were the ‘big trees.’
There were some that were unfurled enough that the ‘fidddle’ was more of a ball of green.
I managed to see and photography several that were the spirals within spirals. Maybe these are ideas for a Zentangle tile!
Finally – hibiscus. I like their huge petals, the blends of color, the gentle curves, and the complex centers.
Tomorrow – I’ll post about the Longwood water lilies.
