Week of July 12, 2020

The move from Florida to our Finger Lakes summer residence takes us from midsummer to springtime flora.  Our evening walks provide the opportunity to view many WILDFLOWERS covering the roadsides of Keuka Bluff.  A very short-lived favorite is the oxeye daisy, with banks of white daisies with yellow centers.  A newly appreciated flower is the low bush called Jersey Tea, with bright white clusters of fine “bottle-brush” flowers.  A fragrant low bush with small pink and white flowers now covering many slopes is spreading dogbane.  Another slope-covering plant is the sweet pea, mostly dark pink but some white blooms also, spreading on long vines.  A northern bush extending down to the Finger Lakes is the Thimbleberry, with its rose-like flowers and handsome leaves usually in shady places like our ravines coming down the hillsides.  At TAProots farm, the lawns are decorated with a bright yellow legume that grow in large, spreading clusters.  Finally, the roadsides have huge banks of orange day lilies naturalized in the ditches, again with a few weeks of blooms.  June had very little rain, with some showers in July to wake the flowers up for us.  It is always a thrill to enjoy two springs a year!