Three rather different takes on cattail fluff
Raising the ante on yesterday’s “two rather different takes” theme,
here you have three views of cattails (Typha sp.) shedding fluff.
The most advanced stage is at the top, the least advanced in the middle.
All three pictures come from Round Rock’s Meadow Lake Park on August 23rd.
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Over the past year and a half I’ve reported on various illegal moves to treat people with different racial and ethnic characteristics differently. The other day I became aware of yet another one. Here’s the introductory paragraph in a class action lawsuit filed against Amazon on July 20:
Amazon.com enters into contracts with “delivery service partners” to bring packages to its patrons. It also engages it patently unlawful racial discrimination by providing a $10,000 bonus to “Black, Latinx, and Native American entrepreneurs” who act as its delivery service partners, while withholding this stipend from Asian-Americans and whites who deliver Amazon packages. Plaintiff Crystal Bolduc brings suit to enjoin Amazon.com from continuing these racially discriminatory practices, and to recover classwide damages on behalf of everyone who has suffered unlawful racial discrimination on account of this program.
It took my country hundreds of years to finally adopt laws that put an end to racial and ethnic discrimination. It pains me to learn there are still Americans who want to flout those laws and go back to discriminating against people based on their immutable physical characteristics. It’s barbaric.
© 2022 Steven Schwartzman
Portraits of Wildflowers 
These three work beautifully as a set. The third image makes me want to stroke that soft fluff… 🙂
Ann Mackay
September 5, 2022 at 6:28 AM
I wish the Internet let me convey the actual sensation of feeling that soft fluff.
Steve Schwartzman
September 5, 2022 at 6:37 AM
love the 3 perspectives
beth
September 5, 2022 at 8:25 AM
I could’ve included more stages but three’s already pushing it for me in one post.
Steve Schwartzman
September 5, 2022 at 9:01 AM
Cattail fluff is a photography treasure for artistic exploration.
Peter Klopp
September 5, 2022 at 9:55 AM
Amen to that. Cattail fluff has been providing me with nature pictures for 20 years.
Steve Schwartzman
September 5, 2022 at 10:00 AM
It’s neat to see Cattails in their different stages. Soon the fluff will be floating on the breeze dropping its seeds as it goes.
circadianreflections
September 5, 2022 at 11:36 AM
And over 200,000 seeds, at that.
Steve Schwartzman
September 5, 2022 at 1:53 PM
😀
circadianreflections
September 6, 2022 at 10:09 AM
! ! (each exclamation mark counts for a hundred thousand).
Steve Schwartzman
September 6, 2022 at 11:33 AM
We are understaffed here, but several people want to help us out by mowing the lawns. Seriously, I have NEVER mown any of the big lawns here. The summer staff kids perceive the mower as something like the bumper cars on the Boardwalk, but without the other bumper cars. Anyway, one of the kids ran over a cat tail, and really did not know what to make of it. He thought he ran over a ‘plush toy’ (which is the politically correct term for what was formerly known as ‘stuffed animal’.) He was not certain that it was not a ‘real’ animal though. He seemed to be quite upset when someone explained to him that it was just a cat tail, . . . which necessitated further explanation. It is all okay now.
tonytomeo
September 5, 2022 at 5:02 PM
Yes, kids sometimes take things literally. I remember when I was young I came across an explanation of what to do if you get a foreign body in your eye. All I could think about was the body of a foreign person, and I couldn’t imagine how that could get in anyone’s eye.
Steve Schwartzman
September 5, 2022 at 5:28 PM
Your top and bottom photos reminded me that I’ve always wanted to do this. Maybe this weekend.
Whether photographed or played with, they are oddly satisfying, just as someone in the video says.
shoreacres
September 6, 2022 at 10:09 PM
I have indeed pinched cattails and watched the seed-bearing fluff explode outward. Try it. You’ll like it. Cattail power lives!
Steve Schwartzman
September 7, 2022 at 8:18 AM
I tried it, and it was great fun. I had to make myself stop after three. I couldn’t believe the softness of the piles of fluff.
shoreacres
September 10, 2022 at 7:54 PM
Glad to hear it. Everyone should have that experience. I expect the mechanism has some scientific application, though I have no idea what.
Steve Schwartzman
September 10, 2022 at 9:56 PM
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