Learning from Experience

Things I saw in the park when I went out for a walk after yet another rain - or alternatively, the rain caught me there:

27 June: a snail on the underside of a bench, which I spotted from the opposite bench, and don't ask me how I took the photo without seeing what exactly I was shooting at. The flash-less photos were hopelessly grainy, so this one is the relatively best I got.


2 July: at last a rainbow, albeit a barely visible one (it was very pale "in person" too):

Photos from 20 June.

I spotted that caterpillar in one of those little gardens/lawns around apartment buildings. The plant it was sitting on must be either dill or fennel (to my shame, I have trouble telling them apart). I can only hope the plant's owner(s) never saw the "visitor" because not everybody is a caterpillar lover like me. It was at least 5 cm (2 inches) long - the caterprillar and not the plant, LOL. Two people in a Bulgarian entomology group on Facebook tentatively identified it as a Old World Swallowtail, Papilio machaon. I searched for images of larvaes of that species and the markings on most of them weren't quite the same, but this one is pretty close.

I only returned to look for it tonight and it was no longer there; let's hope that it has survived and is in a safe place.



And here are the clouds over the new aprk that same evening just because I liked them, but Ithink they looked pinker "in person":

...when I realized that the Facebook algorithms had probably decided that I was a Jew and that's why a Jewish magazine that I hadn't recognized as such (in English) kept cropping up in my newsfeed.

When I started my clumsy attempts to study Hebrew, I didn't expect such consequences. LOL

And, of course, wherever I go, a linguistic discussion starts. So this time I ended up in a company of actual Jews discussing the meaning of the word "schlemiel" under an article about some TV show. Luckily for me, at least the discussion is in English. :)

... on the linden flowers. :)

Photo from 29 May. It wasn't just bees that were eager for the pollen and nectar of this silver linden tree that was one of first in town to come into bloom. I had the insect identified as Rhagonycha fulva in a Bulgarian entomological group on Facebook. Wikipedia says " common red soldier beetle," but I swear ours are orange!

I tried different angles, but never managed all six flowers at once, and I didn't want to remove the branch from that tiled wall because I didn't want it to topple over. And to be honest, a rose branch was all we needed on the kitchen table. LOL

(if you don't know how it got there in the first place, look at my previous entry.)





The petals keep changing their colour, turning paler and their tips turning redder. The flowers are very lightly scented, which is just as well because I don't want an overwhelming scent  inside my home. I don't know how much longer they are going to last, so I admire them whenever I can. And I still can't believe my luck of have a bouquet of my special favourite rose at home, and even possible planting material.

This branch of my very special favourite the Unexpected Rose* ended up in my kitchen, and there are actually six flowers on it, but some of them are hiding behind the others in the photo that I took yesterday evening:



So I passed by again on my way back home this evening and saw that somebody had pruned off this very branch along with some small twigs and left them all on the sidewalk next to the fence. I looked at the apartment building behind the fence, and there was nobody in the yard, on balconies, near windows windows... so I just picked up this branch and took it home. The flowers were fading, but they perked up in the vase. My mother is going to try to start a new plant or two from this branch when the flowers are gone and maybe plant it (them) in the her tiny village garden. Just when I was wondering how to find the exact person who planted the rose to tell me the name of the variety...

And meanwhile the flowers have reached the colour stage of this other branch, which I hope is still there (I didn't specially check for it this evening).



*Nicknamed like that because I first spotted it when it was in bloom when it was almost winter a couple of years ago.

That interesting moment when you discover that you have written down the key combination* for the upper-case Russian letter Э in your Hebrew practice notebook of all places.

*because you use... well, I use a Bulgarian Cyrillic layout that doesn't have the strictly Russian letters.

As I was photographic random plants on my way back home along my usual walking route last evening, my eyes fell on this chamomile plant growing thereon its own:



And then, as I looked closer (maybe it was good that I had put on my spare reading glasses to see better what I was photographing), I suddenly noticed this tiny crab spider on it. I think it would be perfectly camouflaged if it sat on the petals instead of the yellow centre. It was definitely not amused with my attempts to take closeup photos, but I still managed one in focus as best I could in the already fading evening light:



I then had the spider identified as Thomisus onustus in a Bulgarian entomology group on Facebook. When I searched for its common name, it amused me that it's called "pink crab spider" in English and "yellow crab spider" in Bulgarian - but of course each individual's colour more or less depends on the colour of the plant it sits on while waiting for its prey.

I know who planted this one, for a change. :)

It was very pretty while it lasted (photo from 15 April).

Spring ha been advancing so fast that I can't keep up with it, although I keep taking hundreds of photos (many of which are of the same object from different angles, with different camera settings and different degrees of getting ruined by the wind) ... but selecting and editing the best ones is another matter altogether.

There was just one flower on the small young magnolia tree along my walking route this year (its record so far was three flowers, I think). But that one flower was huge, as usual.

9 April


10 April:


12 April, showing some minimal sun damage (or just natural fading), but otherwise still at its best and most open:
(Sorry, I passed by when it was already a little too dark and it shows in the quality of the photo).

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