not over yet!

I thought catkin season was long gone. After all, April is Catkin Month. And May is for Spring Ephemerals. But my son wanted help gathering young black walnut leaves for a “black walnut bay sauce” he is making. And there, to my surprise, was tree after tree full of young catkins. A quick look at Wiki includes a description of the catkins, but does not mention its late late late spring arrival. Hmmm, let me try AI. According to Google AI:

The Catkin Timeline:
To see how the Eastern Black Walnut fits into the broader spring timeline, consider when different trees release their catkins:

Ultra-Early (January to March): Trees like Hazel (Hazelnut), Alder, and Willows (such as Pussy Willow) push out their catkins while the landscape is still completely frozen and bare.
Mid-Spring (April): Maples, Birches, and Oaks begin producing their catkins and flowers as temperatures start to rise.
Late Spring (Late April to June): The Eastern Black Walnut finally begins to drop its yellowish-green male catkins along with hickories and pecans.

Depending on the region, this happens anywhere from mid-April in the South to early June in its northernmost habitats

There you go, problem solved: It is not the latest, but “among the latest”. And since we do not have pecan trees, and only limited hickories, it explains why this black walnut seems so late to me. One of the reasons cited for such late flowering was “simultaneous leafing”. Yup.

eastern American black walnut (Juglans nigra)

impermanence made visible

This photo took about 10 days to make. I love that just enough structure remained to see it was the same flower each time.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Today I turn 62! We are hosting a (sit down) dinner party for 16 on Sunday, the first one in our new house–a christening of sorts. So, I am delaying my birthday celebration until next week…we have A LOT of prep to do the next two days. So much prep that I am going to keep this short and sweet :-)

One more lilac photo before the micro-season disappears until next year.

hold up! I need to photograph that

My husband was making some wood nettle and ramp soup yesterday. This is his pile of carefully selected ramp leaves. Just as he was about to throw them in the soup, they caught my attention. “Hold on!” I yelled. “Those are STILL-worthy.”

Ramps are also known as wild garlic or wild leeks.

ramp leaves (Allium triccocum, and Allium burdickii)

bright, shining, sparkling, dazzling, brilliant, glistening

Here’s some interesting etymology on bleeding heart:

The scientific name, Lamprocapnos spectabilis, can be broken up and translated: The Greek term “Lampro-” translates to words such as “bright”, “shining”, “sparkling”, “dazzling”, “brilliant”, or “glistening”, while the Greek term “-capnos” translates to “smoke”. The Greek term “spectabilis” translates to words such as “spectacular”, “showy”, “remarkable”, or “worth seeing”. The literal translation means “Spectacular sparkling smoke”.

Clearly the Greek namers were smitten with bleeding heart.

bleeding heart (Lamprocapnos spectabilis)