I was told that I could plant my potted Poinsettia from last year but it would not bloom in my garden because the ones they sell at Christmas are specially treated to bloom just that one Christmas and for gardens there is another species or variety. Well . . . they were half-way correct. Mine has three red petals (which are really leaves that turn red) and is nice in my garden, but not really the same as the big multi-red-leaves version I got before Christmas last year. And on my walks through town I also cellphone-snapped a photo of someone else’s Poinsettia which is obviously a different variety and probably one of the garden species that do bloom in the gardens. It is below this photo of the one in my garden . . .
CLICK this cover image for the bookstore and a preview of all 30 pages.
It is too late to get it for Christmas except in the states, but my reasons for publishing now is to have in January and February to share on trips. I have no ambitions to make money on my photography but operate with an almost obsessive desire to create and these little photo books provide that creative outlet more than anything other than maybe this blog! 🙂 The sharing of photos on this blog and in my gallery are two other outlets and to a lesser degree the sharing of bird photos on eBird and butterfly photos on butterfliesandmoths dot org. 🙂 Right now I’m the biggest contributor of butterfly photos from Costa Rica! 🙂
Check this book out with the free preview and let me know what you think! And I hope you are exploring the world where you live! There’s a lot to discover literally everywhere!
I’m bringing 21 photos printed on metal with a special mounting piece to give your wall art a contemporary 3-D look or a nice little shadow. In many sizes and subjects!
This Brown-throated Three-toed Sloth is just one choice! There’s birds, butterflies, monkeys, and flowers too!
🙂 Well . . . sort of! I earlier introduced my indigenous man statue and maybe a long time ago showed my frog flower pot, not sure. And all along I’ve had this little plastic mother frog with a baby frog on its back sitting on the little rustic wood table between my two wooden rocking chairs on my terrace. It was the souvenir gift from the National Association of Zoo Docents at one of their national meetings that I attended in the states and I still have it! 🙂
In addition to the Satyrs, several of these Banded Peacock butterflies are staying around while the bulk of butterflies seem to have gone from my gardens.
Yep! I seem to see my garden a little differently each morning and never tire of walking through it. Here’s my snaps of flowers as seen 2 or 3 mornings ago – I know that they are often the same flowers but I am seeing them differently each time. 🙂 Pura vida!
My Desert Rose in a pot continues to surprise me with blooms year around for 6 years now!
A sample for the email announcement and then a slide show . . .
. . . every few days it seems in my “Miniature Jungle” garden. Here is the unusual bloom or flower on my Ti Plant (Cordyline fruticosa) which rarely blooms but its leaves always give color to my garden kind of like the leaves of the Crotons! 🙂
Ti Plant (Cordyline fruticosa) in Atenas, Alajuela, Costa Rica
And then shots of the whole plants from both above and below (I’m on the side of a hill). A rich, deep red swath of my garden! 🙂
I never before thought of my garden as a place of carnage, but insects eating other insects is quite normal and helps with the balance and ecology – then I witnessed it first hand this past Tuesday morning as I focused my camera on what I hoped was a new butterfly species (it was!). This, my first Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak (Strymon istapa) was flying and landed on one of my Heliconia flowers (1st photo below) and when I snapped this photo that tiny Jumping Spider (Salticidae) down below him in the photo jumped up on the little butterfly (with attached silk thread) and grabbed the butterfly by its head, biting it with a venomous bite that instantly paralyzed and will soon kill the butterfly which the Jumping Spider will eat. I did not stay around for the full meal, but photos of three stages follow this one. 🙂
Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak above and Jumping Spider below. Yes! He jumped that far!
3 more photos below of the capture, paralyzing and preparing to eat.
