Garden Close-ups

There are some really interesting things around the garden these days that demand a very close look.  By that I mean a really close look!  Here's a selection of garden close-ups I've captured in the past week or two.

The stamens and pistils of the day lilies are always worth a close look.

Some of our Brown-eyed Susans have suddenly burst into bloom.

But we also have a lot of False Sunflowers.  At first glance the flowers look similar, but the colour and arrangement of the stamens and pistils is quite different.

A tiny bee on a False Sunflower - I wish I knew more about identifying insects.

I like the bright mixture of colours in the Sneezeweed or Helenium flowers.

These are the tiny seeds of the Avens, which forms a bur that will dry out, fall apart, and you'll find individual tiny seeds sticking to your pants.  This is the sort of bur, with those tiny hooks on the end of each seed, that led to the invention of velcro.

This is one tiny seed of a Goatsbeard flower, which looks like a giant dandelion ball of fluff for awhile.  As individual seeds float away it reaches the point where you can pick out an individual seed to examine its parachute, about an inch and a half across.

In comparison, this is the similar tiny seed and parachute of the Valerian flower, but it's much tinier, perhaps only a 1/4 inch across.  The red circles are spots where two other seeds and their parachutes were attached.  Next time you're checking out your garden, take a close look at what you're seeing!

Linking to: