woodland plants

The woodlands hold lots of different plants from what I am used to seeing in my urban backyard. The alley contains some disturbed area plants like dock, poke, and dandelion, but nothing like what comes from a lush and moist forest. 

Mike and I alternated between riding our mountain bikes and hiking the trails of a place we've both been to several times before. We made lots of new plant discoveries! We were initially looking for alder and basswood trees, but we found much more in addition to those two tree species, including two little woodland creatures!

Prunus serotina (Black Cherry)

Wild Yam

Underwing larva

American Basswood (Linden)

Lady's Slipper

Toad friend

Wild Sarsaparilla

Wild Sarsaparilla flowers

Turkey Tail fungus

baby animals

There are babies all over the place here -- baby squirrels in the front tree (so cute!), baby plants in the garden, and ... baby French angora bunnies!!!

Here are some cute babies for you to gaze at.

Mama squirrel getting groomed by one of her 5 babies

Velvet-soft baby French angora rabbits

tiny plants

Though we experienced a frost here in west MI last night, almost all of my vernal seedlings are coming along well. The potatoes were bitten pretty well, but I can see that there is still nice thick growth of foliage under the frosted leaves, so they'll perk up soon enough.

The garden this year is focused mainly on medicinal herbs.  There will still be, of course, plenty of vegetables, but just not as many as in previous years.

Arnica

California Poppy

tiny Gotu Kola

Lady's Mantle

False Unicorn

Astragalus

little lamb

Oh, I dream of sheep! I love everything about them -- their wool, their portly bodies, the cheeses made from their milk...



I also love their babies, and I was very pleased to find out that I have a second cousin who keeps a flock of Shetland sheep just northeast of where I live.  My grandmother and I took a trip to his farm together to look at the sheep and we spotted a mother who had just given birth to twins! They were so sweet -- their spindly little legs were so wobbly and unstable and their faces were just the cutest things ever.

When mama sheep stepped away from one of her napping babies for a moment, I swooped in and scooped one up. He was a little ram and I had a hard time giving him back to his mother!