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I enjoy taking a
20-minute walk around the building at work every day. It's a peaceful break from a busy work day. There's lots to see, too,
if you look closely. One day in late August I took a camera
along. |
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Here's the "path" I use when I take a walk around the grounds at work. Once around the loop is about six-tenths of a mile. I usually go around twice. |
| The first thing that caught my eye was possibly the most interesting. It looks something like a tomato plant, but much smaller -- the area in the photo is just 6" by 6" or so. Each tiny fruit is about 1/2" long. And the flowers are yellow and periwinkle. Is it edible? I don't know. But fascinating. |  |
| Here's a close-up of that
amazing fruit. Sure looks good, but I've read that red-colored fruit can
be deadly.
P.S. DON'T EAT THIS FRUIT! Although related to the tomato, I found out this fruit is a poisonous belladonna plant called the "nightshade". |
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Next I noticed a thorny little plant that's similar to a thistle. However, it doesn't produce those stiff, spiny heads. It has small purple flowers with dozens of long wispy petals. There's a ladybug on this one. |
| After the flowers mature, they produce these silky little tufts. |  |
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There were
lots of ladybugs around these plants. I let one of them climb onto my
finger, and it walked all around my hand. |
| This is a picture of
stems. At this point you may be thinking "who cares!" The circled area is enlarged below. There's a ladybug climbing up toward the circle near the bottom of the photo. It's on its way to make a meal of some aphids. |
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| Here's an enlargement of
the stems. (OK, so it's a little blurry.) You can see those little dark-colored aphids all over the place. They almost completely cover the stems in spots. Aphids secrete a sweet fluid that ants just love to eat. It's hard to see them, but there are also many ants scurrying all around the aphids on these stems. In fact, the ants actually look after the aphids -- so they'll continue to make that sweet treat. |
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Moving on down the path, I come upon a very large bramble of blackberries. They smell sweet, and many are fat and ready to be eaten. I stop to snack on some of the best ones before I take these photos. |
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They're really good ! |
| There are lots of grasshoppers flying around in the tall grass beside the path. |  |
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The scotch
broom plants produce abundant yellow flowers in the Spring. They also
produce tons of pollen. It gets all over our cars, and up our noses.
This plant is hard on our allergies. |
| A moth catches my eye as it flies past me, then lights on an ivy leaf. |  |
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I know, big deal, yellow flowers. (They looked better in person.) They're probably just weeds. |
| The front of my building has a large lawn and about six fruit trees. There are pears, apples, and these plums. |  |
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Here's the end of my walk -- the front of the building where I work.
"...the
grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord stands
forever." |
