Beautiful Flowers: Images from My Garden - Part 2

In virtually every temperate area on this planet Earth, beautiful flowers can be seen almost everywhere. The variety of shapes and colors just boggles the mind. Even in the northern climates, such as Canada..where I live, there’s abundant beauty, despite a somewhat shorter growing season.

What’s also amazing is that all these beautiful flowers were probably not created this way simply for humans to admire. Birds and insects can see a different spectrum of color in these beautiful flowers. In fact they depend on the various color patterns (many of which we can’t see) to pollinate the flowers. If it weren’t for insects, there would be nowhere near the variety of beautiful flowers we do have.

In Part 1 of these two Beautiful Flowers hub articles, I presented 13 stunning flowers for you to feast your eyes upon. Here, in Part 2, I’ve unleashed another baker’s dozen. Most of these images are close-ups, taken with a modest Fuji digital camera (2600 Zoom). Although its resolution is a somewhat dated 2 megapixels, you can see..it takes some pretty fine close-up images.

These pictures are from two different gardens I’ve had the pleasure of tending over the last 10 years or more.

^ Asiatic Lily (Rienesse)

A beautiful white Asiatic Lily (Rienesse). It has a moderate scent, but not as strong as some of the other Oriental lillies. In this image, you can also see a plethora of light orange Asi-Florum Lillies (Donau) in the background.

^ Tropicana

One of the many beautiful hybrid tea roses, with its luxurious, and long-lasting coral-orange blooms. It has a fabulous fragrance as well.

^ Frittilaria

This semi-tropical perennial, a yellow Fritillaria (also available in orange), is a somewhat difficult flower to grow. It needs a warm, early spring to show its fascinating hanging trumpet-like flowers. Without a protected location though, and a consistently warm March and April, it simply won’t flower in a northern climate. When planting, the large bulb has a strong, garlic-like scent, which helps to keep squirrels and other animals from digging them up.

^ Rose of Sharon

This perennial shrub is a bit of a late starter. The leaves don’t show up until late May, and the blooms don’t come out until August. However, when they do, the bush is covered in these beautiful (in this case, white) flowers. I was lucky enough to catch this wasp lapping up the nectar from the white blossom.

^ Fuschia

You really can’t beat this annual for its strikingly beautiful combination of shapes and colors. It works best in a hanging basket, and prefers light shade more than sun.

^ Blue Spruce Tree (with new buds)

Although this blue spruce tree is obviously not a flower, I love the incredibly soft young needles that push out of the ends of the branches in the spring. You can almost reach out and touch the velvety soft needles.

^ Oriental Poppy

The intense orange flowers of the poppy are a familiar sight in many gardens. The intricate detail of the inner stigma and stamens has always amazed me.

^ Heritage (English rose)

One of the many beautiful English roses bred by British botanist David Austin. His hybrids combine the bloom shape and scent of old English roses, with more modern and hardy hybrid tea roses, providing multiple and longer lasting blooms. This one has a beautiful lemony fragrance as well. This one is just opening up, so you don’t see the multi-layered petals as you would when it’s in full bloom.

^ Lilac

These beautiful clusters of pink/mauve flowers cover the lilac shrub from late spring into mid-summer. The strong lavender-like scent can be noticed from quite a distance, if you happen to be downwind of it.

^ Japonica (Japanese Quince)

This hardy perennial shrub produces these beautiful flowers briefly, in late spring. In late summer, it bears fruit. The quince fruit grows directly on the main stems, rather than hanging from their own stems. The stems have a number of sharp thorns, which makes picking the fruit, a challenge. The fruit is said to make a nice jam, although I’ve never tried. The raw fruit is rather bitter, as I recall.

^ Bachelor’s Button (Cornflower)

This interesting wild flower (also called cornflower) is apparently an annual, although it must self-seed, as I’ve never had to plant them. Very good for attracting bees.

^ Climbing Roses

Although this looks like a shrub rose, it’s actually just a prolific climber. This display of multiple blooms was exceptional for this rose bush, during the 6 years I spent at this house and garden. It usually produced only a few blooms once or twice and then nothing the rest of the season. This was a very good year, obviously.

^ Yellow Flower (unknown variety)

I really don’t know the name of this beautiful annual. It sort of resembles a sunflower, but it’s not a dwarf sunflower, the flower head is about 6cm across, and has a short growth (15 cm tall) habit.

Go Green…Your Garden and your thumb…

Admiring these photos of nature’s handiwork is indeed soothing to the soul. However, you too can have beautiful flowers like these. Gardening is an excellent stress-buster. You needn’t worry about being an expert..learning is half the fun. You’ll be so proud of yourself, and mother nature will thank you. Go ahead..get your hands dirty.

All photos and content ©2011 by +timorous

Note: If you wish to use any of these photos for commercial purposes, let me know in advance. Thank you.