What Pollinates a Snapdragon?

Yellow Snapdragon at Armstrong Nursery.

Southern California fall colors (grin)... However does a bee get into a snapdragon? It doesn't. Apparently, snapdragons are pollinated by bumblebees that either power through the opening or chew through the side of the flower. Honeybees are pretty much locked out.

Fall in San Diego

Monarch Butterfly enjoying the bountiful flowers at Armstrong Nursery. It's getting a little late in the season so the butterflies are a little weather-beaten but still beautiful to watch. The mechanics had the car for an oil change which turned into a brake job, an extra hour or two of waiting and a hundred or two of extra cash. So, in the interim, I walked over to the Soup Plantation for some lunch and a quick jog over to Armstrong. The flowers were still in bloom and the butterflies were still bountiful. It seems that, outside of a few rain drops on the roses, not much changes in Southern California in late October.

Jerusalem Cricket

Mahogany Jerusalem Cricket, Stenopelmatus n. sp. "mahogany". I find these HUGE (just short of 2 inches) crickets out of their normal underground habitats when it's been raining for a few days and really damp out. I suspect, they come up to dry off a bit. These guys are scavengers, feasting on rotting matter, dead animals and plant roots, aerating the soil while they scavenge. They are favored snacks for bats, skunks, foxes and other nocturnal predators. There are many species of these seldom seen, docile, subterranean creatures, many of which are from California. Think of them as ...ahem...earthworms with more character!

White Fronted Bee Eater

White Fronted Bee Eater. These beautiful birds life and nest in cliffside colonies and live on flying insects which they snatch out of the air. They are native to the savannahs of sub-equatorial Africa.

Happy Halloween!

Wishing you all a safe, fun-filled Halloween!

Terns in Flight

Terns in Flight, Tijuana Estuary Wildlife Preserve. I love watching the terns as they take off in huge, graceful flocks of white that zigzag through the sky! In the background, the air ripples in waves (in spite of it being a relatively cool day!).

Black and White Succulent

Sempervivum rubellum in black and white photographed in the setting sun.

Diving Pelican

California Brown Pelican diving for fish. It's really amazing watching these huge, lumbering birds fold in their wings and plummet from the heights!

How to Spot Dolphins

Pelicans, Gulls, Cormorants and Dolphins all mixed together! If you're looking for dolphins, look for the birds first. The birds gather to take advantage of the dolphins efforts at herding fish into a tight school, making an easy meal for the birds! The birds act as a beacon for you to spot the dolphins as the birds congregate in numbers and in mixed groups that would not otherwise occur. Then, if you watch the water, you will see occasional spouts and fins pop up. The same "bird trick" holds true for spotting schools of tuna or other large ocean carnivores that herd bait fish into tight schools or "bait balls." Where there are birds, there is typically something down below herding the bait fish.

Phalies: a grocery store phenomenon or a cultural icon?

Dtps. Chain Xen Pearl x Dtps. Zuma Pixie. Phalaenopsis and their close cousins, the Doritaenopsis (Dtps. = Phal. x Doritis), have become the darlings of the potted plant world. The flowers can last upwards of 3 months and they now come in a plethora of vivid colors. They are amazingly available for as little as $8 in bloom, a feat enabled by mass production and hybridization of these little jewels in Taiwan. The local commercial hybridization of these plants has largely succumbed to foreign imports.

The two biggest questions for these durable little plants are a) when to water? [water about once a week or when the media has dried out]; and b) how do I get it to bloom again? [a 10 degree F drop in temperature will normally precipitate a new bloom spike. The old spike may also be left on and will sometimes generate side branches.]

Orchids In Every Form, Size and Color

Paph. Stone Lovely x Paph Pacific Shamrock. Orchids come in all sorts of colors, shapes and sizes. This one is largely albino allowing the remaining green tones to be more easily seen (the pigment was there all along but covered by the darker pigments). While this particular plant is a hybrid, Paphiopedilums, as a genera, originally come from SouthEast Asia (Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Burma, etc.), Southern China and India. The American relative, also called a lady's slipper, is called a Cyprepedium.

Cirropetalum rothschildianum 'A-Dorabil'

Cirropetalum rothschildianum 'A-Dorabil' FCC/AOS. This dramatic species hails from India where it lives in moist, warm conditions. In cultivation, it grows best in plastic baskets where the media stays moist, but well aerated and not soggy.

Ro Z's Sweet Art Studio

Ro Zinniger showing off one of her wonderful floral cakes at the Gourmet Expo. I had one of her cupcakes for desert at dinner. Yumm!

Phalaenopsis violacea var. alba

Phalaenopsis violacea variety alba. This used to be called violace Sumatra and bellina was called violacea Borneo; however, they've been elevated to different species. As with it's bigger cousin, Phalaenopsis bellina, Phal. violacea is sweetly fragrant although both the plants and the flowers are smaller. As with Phal. bellina, Phal. violacea is also hot growing.

Phalaenopsis bellina

Phalaenopsis bellina. These Phalaenopsis are originally from Borneo where they grow in hot, humid lowland forests. They are wonderfully fragrant and a joy to have in your collection. However, beware, they are a tad sensitive to cold, dank conditions so you'll either want to keep them indoors or in a warm greenhouse.

The Blue Angels

The Blue Angels were visible from much of San Diego yesterday including this shot from Mission Gorge. The Blue Angels are the U. S. Navy’s Flight Demonstration Squadron.

According to the official Blue Angels Website, "The Blue Angels’ mission is to enhance Navy and Marine Corps recruiting efforts and to represent the naval service to the United States, its elected leadership and foreign nations. The Blue Angels serve as positive role models and goodwill ambassadors for the U. S. Navy and Marine Corps.

A Blue Angels flight demonstration exhibits choreographed refinements of skills possessed by all naval aviators. The Blue Angels’ C-130, affectionately known as Fat Albert, begins each demonstration by exhibiting its maximum performance capabilities during a ten-minute performance. Shortly thereafter, you will see the graceful aerobatic maneuvers of the four-jet Diamond Formation, in concert with the fast-paced, high-performance maneuvers of its two Solo pilots. Finally, the team illustrates the pinnacle of precision flying, performing maneuvers locked as a unit in the renowned, six-jet Delta Formation.

The team is stationed at Forrest Sherman Field, Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida, during the show season. However, the squadron spends January through March training pilots and new team members at Naval Air Facility El Centro, California."

Red-Shouldered Hawk Lift-off!

Red-Shouldered Hawk, Buteo lineatus, taking off from Eucalyptus tree after posing for photos for a a few minutes. Actually, there were two of these beautiful hawks fighting over that Eucalyptus tree, possibly because it overlooks the bird feeder (a.k.a. doves for dinner). While chasing each other, they flew low over the deck (maybe 10 feet from me) and then smacked head first into the neighbor's window (which hawks rarely do). He didn't look any worse for the wear and, ironically, as he flew off, the competing hawk returned to claim the tree! It made for great viewing.

Kelp on a Rock

Kelp Roots on Rock, Imperial Beach, California.

Cool tattoo

Brian Holwerda playing lead Guitar for Joanie Mendenhall, showing off a really cool tattoo at Saturday's performance. Have you ever wondered what the story is behind a really detailed tattoo? If you look closely at Brian's tattoo, you'll see the corner of Haight and Ashbury streets in San Francisco (in the tenderloin?). You'll see what looks like Kwan Yin, the goddess of mercy playing a flute and in the folds of her robe, San Francisco in what appears to be the midst of an earthquake and fire, rocks a flying, a cable car, a shark and much more. I'd bet there's quite a story behind this tatoo!

Where does the word tattoo come from anyhow? It is almost certainly Polynesian in origin. In New Zealand: ta to=tattoo; in Tahiti/Otaheite tatu= puncturation; in Hawaiian: kakau=tattoo (pronounced Ka ka-oo, no T's in Hawaiian).

Dolphins Herding Dinner

Bottlenose Dolphins, Tursiops truncatus, Tijuana Estuary, San Diego, California. Bottlenose dolphins herding bait fish. We spotted the dolphins by following the swarm of birds hovering above, each bird hoping to steal a few fish from the hard working dolphins.

Spiney Seaweed

Spiney seaweed washed up on the beach at the Tijuana Estuary Preserve.

Joanie Mendenhall Live at the Adams Street Fair

Joanie Mendenhall, one of San Diego's leading Pop artists, today playing live at the Adams Street Fair. Missed it? Listen to her here!

Premier Kites

Huge foil being flown by PremierKites.Com over San Diego Bay, taking advantage of some fleeting sunny days as we head into Autumn.

Banana Boat!

The Banana Boat in the photo looked about as big as an aircraft carrier, maybe longer. I started wondering just how many bananas go through San Diego so I looked it up. Here's what I found compliments of an article called, "Port Brings Home the Goods." "The banana trade is unlikely to be affected by the economic downturn. Bananas are America's No. 1 imported fruit with the average American consuming more than 28 pounds annually. Dole imports 468,000 tons of bananas through the Tenth Avenue Marine Terminal. Put another way, Dole brings in 185 million bananas each month through the Port's Tenth Avenue terminal." The ship name said Dole Honduras. It looked like they get a huge load of bananas and then dock the ship and slowly offload them as needed. I believe they ripen them on demand so they can actually keep them green for quite a while.

Red Breasted Merganser

Female Red Breasted Merganser, Mergus serrator, is a diving duck. I've actually seen multiple mergansers act in concert to herd fish in the shallows, their bodies just under the surface of the water. They catch the (slippery little) fish with their serrated beaks (hence the name). They also eat aquatic insects, crustaceans and frogs and are reputed to fly in level flight at up to 80mph, one of the fastest birds in level flight. Note that Raptors such as hawks and eagles achieve their speed in a dive, not in level flight.

Sand Bass!

Fishermen with Sand Bass. Some guys out fishing in San Diego Bay with a Sand Bass they caught. Supposedly, the water in the bay's been polluted by the shipyard and the Navy base so it's not so clear that eating anything out of the Bay is a good idea but they were having a good time and they probably aren't getting a substantial part of their diet out of the bay.

Barry Bowl Pottery

Barry Pechersky. Barry posing with one of his beautiful bowls at the at the Clay Artists of San Diego Booth at the Artwalk on the Bay. His bowls absolutely glow in the sun! If you enjoy his bowls, you can contact Barry at barrybowlpottery@cox.net.

At the Artwalk on the Bay

Pierre, of Pottery by Pierre, describing a kiln to one of the customers at the Clay Artists of San Diego Booth at the Artwalk on the Bay.

Monarch Butterfly

Monarch butterfly, Danaus plexippus. This Monarch Butterfly was reaching in to sip some nectar out of a hanging basket of Lantana at Armstrong Nursery. I ran back to the car to get the camera and waited a bit for the Monarch to come back. Shortly afterwards, it was joined by a Tiger Swallowtail. I enjoyed watching them flit from flower to flower so much I ended up buying a small pot of Lantana for the front yard.

Collared Lory

Collared Lory, Phygis solitarus, is relatively abundant in its native habitat. It is found on the islands of Matei and Taveuni in the Fijian Islands. It is seldom seen in captivity, perhaps because it has not often been successfully bred in captivity.

Monkey See....

Wolf's Guenon, Cercopithecus wolfi wolfi. These handsome monkeys are from Central Africa, mostly between Congo and Uganda, where they live in forests bordering water. They live mostly on a diet of fruit supplemented with seeds and insects. The Guenons are related to baboons, mangabeys, and macaques.

Sun Bear Sponge Bath

Female Malayan Sun Bear, Helarctos malayanus. Sun Bears are from the tropical forests of Southeast Asia and are one the most skillful climbers of all the bears. They are one of the smallest bears, a mature bear standing at about 4 ft. tall. Sun Bears have sickle-shaped claws and large, naked soled paws that enable them to hang and climb within the dense tropical forest canopy with ease. Sun Bears are omnivores, most of their diet being typical of their tropical, arboreal habitat including lizards, birds, and small mammals, fruits, eggs, termites, palm shoots, honey (hence their alternate name, honey bears), berries, sprouts, insects, roots, cocoa, and coconuts (yes, they can crack open coconuts!).

Sandpipers on an Empty Beach

A flock of Sandpipers at low tide at Imperial Beach. When running or flying in groups they typically do so in unison making an amazing display as the waves come in or as they dart back and forth through the air. Their diet consists of crustaceans, insects and worms that they pull out of the sand/mud.

Yellow Phalaenopsis

Phalaenopsis Yellow Brite Lite. Yellow Phalaenopsis have come a long way in the last ten or so years. The colors are clear, concise and tend not to fade much. Unfortunately, few carry the wonderful fragrance of some of their ancestors but, as with most Phalaenopsis, they last a really long time and really brighten the house up.

Shawn Rohlf and the Buskers

Shawn Rohlf and the Buskers singing to the kids at the Hillcrest Farmers Market. They've been doing this as long as I can remember and the kids always have an awesome time!

Down the Alley

Morning Glory, Ipomoea purpurea. I was walking down the street to the car when I saw a morning glory on an old, beat-up, white garage. This morning glory was literally blanketed with flowers that glowed in the bright afternoon sunshine and proved just too nice to pass up!

Mr. Grasshopper Looking at his Reflection

Just your lowly grasshopper admiring his own reflections in the glass...or maybe he's really staring up at the dorky photographer. Either way, there were actually a whole series of double reflections but I edited them out in the name of being succinct.

Mrs. Spider Weaving Her Web

Spider patching her web. If you click on it, you can actually see the new strand she's laying down for the night. I caught her in the last few rays of the setting sun.

Dancing at the Farmer's Market

Couple Dancing at the Farmer's Market. There's a little band at the farmer's market. They've been there as long as I can remember, entertaining the crowd for tips. The parents will bring their kids and the kids will dance, sing along and generally have a wonderful time in a totally unfettered, unself-conscious sort of way. This time, some of the grown-ups decided to get into the swing of it as well!

Encyclia ambigua

Encyclia ambigua. Encyclia ambigua is native to Chiapas, Mexico through Guatemala where it grows at around 3000 to 6000 feet.

SPLASH! Animals

SPLASH! Animals. This is the latest live show at the San Diego Zoo. Two people get up on the stage and paint an animal at the same time. They certainly work well together and were really popular with the crowd! In fact, they were so popular with the crowd, I snapped these pictures by holding the camera high up above my head and pointing it at the stage to get above the crowd. You can find out more about them at www.splashanimals.com. Their description says: "This award-winning conservation-focused entertainment experience combines art, music, choreography and features endangered species."

Komodo Dragon

Komodo Dragon, Varanus komodoensis. These guys are native to the Sunda Island Chain in Indonesia and grow to 10 feet long and 350 lbs. Females lay about twenty eggs at a time, the eggs hatching in April, when insects are most plentiful. Young Komodo dragons dwell in trees, safe from predators and adult komodos. They may live as long as fifty years.

They are monitor lizards (think Gila Monster) and will eat almost anything they can catch from insects to goats to water buffalo. Their bites contain lots of nasty bacteria; the resultant infections can be fatal, thus providing a time delayed meal for these hungry little beasties.

Tentacled Snake

Tentacled Snake, Erpeton tentaculatum. The Tentacled snake is completely aquatic. It is a rear-fanged venomous snake that uses it's "tentacles" to sense (and then attack) passing fish in murky Southeast Asian waters which it then quickly swallows. The tentacled snake is reportedly harmless to humans.

Clint and His Amazing Barking Meerkat

Clint and his amazing barking meerkat. Whenever Clint talked, the sound of his voice caused his meerkat to bark! Clint thought it was some sort of protective reflex like relaying an alarm. These days, the zoo keepers at the San Diego Zoo get out to talk to the public a lot more than they used to and, if you keep an eye out for them, you can often learn all sorts of animal facts and trivia.

Do You Know Your Constitutional History?

I figured I'd take a quick pause in the photos for a bit of Constitutional history from our friends at Wikipedia. Isn't the Internet wonderful?

Did you know that inter-racial marriage used to be prohibited in the United States and was only fully legalized in 1967? Inter-racial marriage was referred to as miscegenation. The anti-misceganation laws were finally eliminated by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1967 in the Loving v. Virginia case, where the U.S. Supreme Court declared anti-miscegenation laws a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment and therefore unconstitutional.

As per Wikipedia (note clickable link to the Wikipedia page and excerpt below):

Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967)[1], was a landmark civil rights case in which the United States Supreme Court, by a 9-0 vote, declared Virginia's anti-miscegenation statute, the "Racial Integrity Act of 1924", unconstitutional, thereby overturning Pace v. Alabama (1883) and ending all race-based legal restrictions on marriage in the United States."

The history of the case prior to the Supreme Court Case is as follows. "In 1958, Richard and Mildred Loving had married in Washington, D.C. to evade Virginia's anti-miscegenation law (the Racial Integrity Act). Having returned to Virginia, they were arrested in their bedroom for living together as an interracial couple. The judge suspended their sentence on the condition that the Lovings would leave Virginia and not return for 25 years. In 1963, the Lovings, who had moved to Washington, D.C, decided to appeal this judgment. In 1965, Virginia trial court Judge Leon Bazile, who heard their original case, refused to reconsider his decision. Instead, he defended racial segregation, writing:

"Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix."

The Lovings then took their case to the Supreme Court of Virginia, which invalidated the original sentence but upheld the state's Racial Integrity Act. Finally, the Lovings turned to the U.S Supreme Court. The court, which had previously avoided taking miscegenation cases, agreed to hear an appeal. In 1967, 84 years after Pace v. Alabama in 1883, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in Loving v. Virginia that:

"Marriage is one of the 'basic civil rights of man,' fundamental to our very existence and survival.... To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State's citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discriminations. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not to marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State."

Up a Tree

Tree Trimmer way up in a tree, over a pond full of rocks, hacking branches off. On the bright side, he gets to work outdoors without direct supervision. On the down side, well, it's a long way down and wet and full of rocks.

Albanism in Orchids

Phalaenopsis violacea var. alba 'Wanchaio Jungle White' SM/TOGA x Self. Typically, albanism in orchids refers to the absence of color due to the suppression of at least one gene loci, typically for the expression of the color lavendar. If you had a red flower with both lavendar and yellow expression, the absence of lavendar may also result in a yellow or aurea form. In this case, the green of the flower is still expressed (yet another loci) resulting in a wonderful contrast between the white flower and the green segment tips.

Nothing but the Best!

Poodle in a pink baby stroller being pushed by an elderly gentleman at the San Diego Botanical Gardens. My guess is the poodle was getting too old to walk along with that old man so he bought it a stroller. It's kind of sweet, really.

Featured Artist: Garrett Boetzer

Gargoyle with jet pack and hand control by Garrett Boetzer of Red Dragon Metal Design. Garrett also does beautiful floral sculptures; however, the gargoyles were my favorite for their whimsical playfulness. Garrett's a really nice guy who enjoys talking about his artwork. You can find out more about Garrett and his sculpture at www.reddragonmetaldesign.com or via email at rdmetaldesign@hotmail.com.

Beauty Everywhere

Marguerite Daisies (also known as Oxeye Daisies), Leucanthemum vulgare, towering over a background of Dusty Miller. I really like the contrast of the white daisies against the silver background. Really, the beauty is not in the rarity (these are quite common) but in the lighting, color and the contrast.

Harp and Flute Players

Musicians playing the Harp and Flute at the art gala at the San Diego Botanic Gardens. It's been years since I've seen a harp player so it was a nice treat.