Hunting the Larkspur Violet

Posted on May 11, 2016 by Laura Lindblom under Photography, Writing

Wildflower hunting is as good as a treasure hunt. Actually, better. Wildflowers aren’t yet taxed. For years, I’ve been fascinated by wildflowers, particularly by the violet family. The intricacies of the violet family, the variety, the color. I find them enchanting. Back in Illinois, I was thrilled to discover that we had three different species of violets in our backyard, and I looked for others when we went hiking. Now in the Black Hills, there are yet new ones to discover and marvel at! A few days ago, I stumbled across a larkspur violet – I had never found one before, and wasn’t sure I’d see another this spring, so I snapped away with my long lens, even though I knew it was pointless – I was right. It was pointless. Half an hour later, I found another cluster and made a mental note to come back on my next day off with my shorter lens.
This morning, Dad and I went on a walk along the Hole-in-the-Wall trail, and there along the path was a larkspur violet couple. Of course, I’d left my camera at home, since it was cloudy. Flowers really do photograph the best in bright sunlight, so that the transparency of their petals is captured. Once again, I made a mental note. When it warmed up a little later in the day, I headed out again, armed with my camera and correct lens, intent on photographing my larkspur violet, starting with the one along Hole-in-the-Wall trail. It had been cloudy all day, and rather windy. But no sooner had I started on the trail than the cloud cover broke, illuminating little families of darkthroat shootingstar, not-yet-bloomed columbine, and the delicate cups of the lanceleaf bluebell.
My larkspur violet was waiting where I left it. The delicate striping of the throat, the satiny hairs, the shimmering petals are all typical of violets, but the leaves are what set this violet apart. Most violets have solid heart-shaped leaves, while the larkspur violet, also known as the prairie violet or birdfoot violet, has divided leaves. Because of that characteristic, this little beauty can’t be misidentified.
Satisfied with the proof of my find, I headed back down the trail. It was warm, in spite of the breeze. A gorgeous day. The whole landscape was afire with the colors brought by the recent rain. The emerald greens, the deep fuchsia of shootingstars, the blues and pinks and purples of bluebells, the glinting white and gold of wild strawberries and starry false Solomon’s seal. I was almost home when a flicker of purple caught my eye. Almost back at home, growing unobtrusively on a pineneedle-covered bank was another larkspur violet. And there was another. And another. A whole little colony of them.

It was a successful hunt.

Weeds and Wildflowers

Posted on May 5, 2016 by Laura Lindblom under Photography, Writing

Just a short ways down the road from where I work is Canyon Lake, and Rapid Creek feeds into this. Along Rapid Creek, upstream of the lake, is a little wooded dirt path. With the creek running on one side, and trees towering above, I could almost forget the sounds of town as I poked along in the grasses over my lunch hour, hunting wildflowers and watching birds and listening to grasshoppers. So pleasant and refreshing.
Dandelions were in abundance, and a clump or two of early dame’s rocket. There was a carpet of not-yet-blooming violets, with a couple of over-eager violets trying to bloom. Then there was the columbine! I missed good pictures of this gem last year, because of a sub-par camera, and I snapped away happily. And then I got to thinking – What is it about dandelions that makes us consider them weeds, while flowers like columbine and blue flax and shootingstar we consider wildflowers? Whether something is a weed or a wildflower depends very much on perspective. A limited perspective fails to see the beauty or even usefulness of the weed – It may be a nuisance, I suppose, and grow where it isn’t wanted, but isn’t the weed beautiful as well in its own way? Doesn’t it provide pollen for our pollinators, and color to our landscapes? Sometimes I view life this way. Because I can’t see or refuse to see the meaning in something or because I am frustrated with a certain situation, I consider it bad or ugly or undesirable. But might my perspective just be wrong or limited? A broader perspective, a more whole perspective, might be able to see the lessons to be learned, the service to be done, the experience to be gained, and the very real joy to be experienced if I allow my perspective to be broadened. Sometimes God gifts us with difficult or trying situations or experiences or people in order to grow us in our walk of faith and to grow us in holiness. One step of that is learning to see God’s sovereignty in our lives, in both the rocky place and the pleasant places.

I want the perspective that lets me see weeds as wildflowers.

Ghost Canyon Wildflowers

Posted on May 4, 2016 by Laura Lindblom under Photography, Writing

This time of year is when the wildflower world really comes to life in the Hills. Hiking in a ravine near Ghost Canyon Road today, winsome little spring flowers were lurking in the shadows beneath trees and on the shaded sides of the ravine. The shade was pleasant and cool, the sun was golden and becoming harsh, and the pines reached their gnarled limbs towards the blue heavens. Spring’s first wildflowers are diminutive and unassuming – Later come the flashy milkweeds and Joe Pye weed and sunflowers, flowers that aren’t content to simply be. But spring’s first flowers are the epitome of serenity.
Like pale butterflies sunning themselves, the star lilies bloomed on the warm, fragrant, open hillsides, understated, clinging close to the dusty earth. Leaving the sunny hillsides behind, we wended our way through brush that will soon be too thick to walk through, snagging spiderwebs and burdock and wayward grasshoppers.
Tucked back under dead tree limbs, the shootingstars hid away in the ferns and grasses, almost unnoticeable in spite of their bold color. The flowers nodded on their long stalks, swaying in the summery breeze, almost twinkling in the scattered sunlight.
Blue-eyed grass is a favorite of mine, to see it peeking up shyly, sparkling here and there in the sunlit places like a deep blue gem. Mankind just can’t craft the kind of beauty that God scatters liberally through His wonderful Creation.

The air was heavy today with the dusty, sagey, piney scent belongs to the Black Hills. The sunlight wakes it up, just like it wakes up the wildflowers in time for spring! My heart will always quicken when I catch a glimpse of yet another of my botanical favorites, or a new one I haven’t yet gotten to know. Over the last year, these flowers have become like friends, a special part of this special place I now call home.

May Day Blue

Posted on May 1, 2016 by Laura Lindblom under Photography, Scenic, Wildlife, Writing

Yesterday I mused wistfully that Harney Peak frosted white would have been stunning under a clear blue sky. The drive to church this morning didn’t disappoint! We’ve hardly seen the sun in the last week or so, but this morning it finally decided to come out and wake everything up! Amazingly enough, we had left sufficiently early for church this morning so that we actually had time to pull over on Palmer Creek Road on Hwy 244 so I could snap a few pictures.
Other than on Harney Peak and the rest of the high-elevation hills which were glazed with frost, everything has greened up, refreshed by the rain and snow we’ve had over the last couple of weeks. Over the next few weeks, spring will truly come rushing in!
Twitterpated birds are busy nesting, making a racket in every tree. Goldfinches have gotten their summer plumage and no longer look scruffy, and bluebirds flicker brightly in pastures and from fence post to tree to shrub. Meadowlarks are back to sitting on fence wires, singing their little hearts out – What a life!

This really is a glorious time of the year. What other time of the year can one enjoy the serene beauty of winter and all the fire and life of springtime, all in the same day? And I’m really so glad we live in a world with color. God didn’t need to create color. But He did.

The Cat’s Meow

Posted on April 28, 2016 by Laura Lindblom under Pets/Domestic/Farm Animals, Photography, Writing

There’s nothing quite like the company of a cat. Or cats. I understand, some people have very strong negative feelings on this topic. If you are one of those unfortunate individuals, you doubtless just haven’t met the right cat yet. Luna is a bit on the dense side, it is true, but you’ll not find a more beautiful feline specimen. Ever since he was a few months old, he has looked just like “textbook pictures” of a cat. Gorgeous. And there is almost nothing that I find quite as winsome and heart-entangling as Kashka’s attempts at a meow when she wants attention, or as calming and comforting as her rumbling purr.
Not a lot is known about why or how cats purr – There are suggestions, some of which may have some merit, but it tickles my funny bone that purring is one of those things that just has modern science a little bit bewildered. Then I stumbled across this from the Live Science website: “A domestic cat’s purr has a frequency of between 25 and 150 Hertz, which happens to be the frequency at which muscles and bones best grow and repair themselves. It is, therefore, speculated that cats naturally evolved their purr over time as a survival tactic – a biomechanical healing mechanism that ensured speedier recoveries.”
I read that and just kind of scratched my head. That’s pretty amazing! They just naturally evolved their purr to within a specific frequency as a way to equip the species? (My sister Sarah’s response to this was, “Why don’t we purr?”)

Not to create any tidal waves of controversy here, but I have another idea – What if cats were given the ability to purr specifically at the frequency best for muscle and bone repair by Someone who knew what He was doing? And because God wasn’t driven by rigid practicality in His Creation, He created a sound that human beings in general find to be soothing and relaxing and delightful, simply because He could, because His Creation was meant to be a blessing and a joy, something that causes us to thank and glorify Him. What if what we see around us that seems miraculous actually is miraculous, and is a gift from the hand of a good and loving God? Perhaps that sounds silly and childish. But I find that the more deeply convinced I become that these things are gifts from God, the more beautiful His Creation is to me. I find that my love and appreciation the natural world is enhanced and intensified by the evidence I see of God’s fingerprints all over Creation. It humbles me and overwhelms me.

I got home today from work and found Anna out in the corral playing with her kitties – What fun she (and they!) were having, and what fun it was to watch the antics! The little spectacle was, well…the cat’s meow.

Winter Lingers

Posted on April 27, 2016 by Laura Lindblom under Photography, Scenic, Writing

When I woke up yesterday morning, there was snow on the ground and continuing to fall from a heavy-clouded sky, a wet snow, melting and puddling in the red dirt of the driveway, but lightly coating everything else. I ran outside in my summertime footwear, refusing to go back to socks and boots. “Cold feet, cold feet, cold feet!” I scraped an inch or two of slushy snow off the truck, then ran back to the house for my camera. “Cold feet, cold feet, cold feet!” What a change from our 80-degree weather on Friday and Saturday!
The driveway up to Highway 40 was a fairyland. Trees were silvered with snow, grasses were bent and covered. The springtime landscape was muted and softened and pale. Low-lying cloud cover obscured hills and hilltops, altering the scenes I am used to on my drive in to work. I’ll have to admit, on Monday I wasn’t looking forward to the snow that was expected – But something about a quiet snowfall always changes my mind. The magic never fails to enchant me.
Snow and rain fell pretty much all day yesterday, as temperatures hovered in the 30s and 40s. When it finally warms up, how green everything will be! On the way home, I drove in and out of places where the snow was clinging tenaciously. Higher hilltops had snow on them, and the tops of trees were frosted over.
Living in the mountains, even relatively low-elevation mountains such as the Black Hills, the weather patterns are unpredictable and extremely changeable from one town to the next. As I drove home from church on Sunday, I drove into rain a mile or so outside Custer, as a pickup truck covered in 2 inches of snow whizzed past me the other direction. The snow and slush increased a few more miles down the road, then tapered off as I approached Mt. Rushmore. And at home, it was sunny and springlike.
I love the varied weather and the hesitating entry of each successive season. At this point, I am fully ready for springtime, the sun and the warmth that chases away the chill. But for now, winter lingers. Might as well enjoy it.