sprite writes
broodings from the burrow

August 8, 2017


a trip to the country
posted by soe 9:33 am

Rudi and I try to make it out to Poolesville, Maryland, at least once mid-summer for a visit to the McKee-Beshers Wildlife Management, where they have several fields of sunflowers (as well as fields of other plants). We were late this year, so the first field had mostly grown over, but the third field was still in okay shape. (We skipped the second field, because it requires going through the marsh and I can’t find our bug spray. Given the state of my calves right now, I’m going to say that was an excellent call. So itchy!)

Here are some of the highlights:

Sunflowers

Sentry

Sunflowers

Rudi and the Sunflower

Sunflower

Small Sunflowers

Sunflower

We didn’t just see plants. There were lots of insects (in addition to the unseen mosquitoes) and thus a lot of birds. The birds were too quick for me (I’m pretty sure I saw a mountain bluebird, but it could have been an Eastern one, and there were definitely gold and purple finches, as well as their plainer avian relatives), but I caught a few of the bugs:

American Lady Butterfly
An American Lady Butterfly

Bumblebee
Bumblebee

Dogbane Leaf Beetle
Dogbane Leaf Beetle

Honeybee
Honeybee

Common Green Darner
Common Green Darner

Finally, the advantage of coming out at the end of the season, rather than the beginning, is that you find out that a lot of people have a sense of humor:

Sunflower Faces

Sunflower Graffiti

In case that last shot is hard to see, people have picked out seed coverings to depict crosses, initials, and other designs. Essentially, agricultural graffiti.

Category: dc life. There is/are 3 Comments.



Fantastic photos! Especially those darling bees!

Comment by AsKatKnits 08.09.17 @ 6:29 am

Lovely! The pictures of the insects are really cool

Comment by Tasha B (heidenkind) 08.09.17 @ 11:55 pm

Great photos. Thanks for sharing them with us.

love,

dod

Comment by bob fearnley 08.11.17 @ 12:51 pm