Perdurable

Click for greater sharpness.

Not only has the continuing mild weather prompted some of our native plants to bloom early, but it has allowed two fall-blooming species I’m aware of to keep flowering through December and January and now even the beginning of February. One of those is goldeneye, and the other is the type of mistflower that botanists call Ageratina havanensis. You last saw it about six weeks ago, when I was already pleased to keep finding its flowers so late in the year.

During my productive session on the west side of Mopac on the morning of February 1, I saw both of those species, and in one place they were even growing side by side, each no doubt surprised to find the other still hanging on. Of the photographs I took of the mistflower, the one shown here is closer than, and at a different angle from, the one I posted in December: the width of today’s image represents about an inch or maybe an inch and a half in real life. Some of the flower heads I saw four days ago had noticeable tinges of pink from still-unopened buds, but since you saw that in a photograph taken on October 31, today I’ve chosen to show a view mostly lacking that bit of color: this is quite a different winter white from the snow and ice that some of you are experiencing.

© 2012 Steven Schwartzman