 A Wild Flower On Neebish IslandThe sensuous pleasure of a wild flower picture, it turned out, made me fall in love with my camera all over again. I've always liked the camera -- it really suits me well. But at Neebish, the northwoods forest floor is carpeted with a deep, softly fragrant blanket of needles of pine and cedar. This presents an unmatched opportunity to do such things as lie blissfully on one's stomach, camera in hand, taking one shot after another with every possible variation in settings. Shooting the forest and the wildflowers became an almost endless, wordless photography workshop. I found a bunch of Indian Pipe sprouting up from the dry needles like a bouquet of bleached bones. It's hard to believe anything so white can be a plant and not a mushroom, but it is a plant. I looked up some information about it when I came home, and discovered that it is related to blueberries, of all things. I didn't see any recommendations about eating its fruit, though. I think a person should probably stick with the blueberries. Some people would know the names of all the plants and flowers there, but I am not one of them. I know I recognized Indian Pipe and Bunchberry, Joe-Pye Weed and Dame's Rocket and Boneset. Maybe someone who sees the photos will write to me and identify my other plants properly. Here's the best site I've found so far for wild flowers picture identifications.) I'm told that Yellow Pond-Lily (SpatterDock) is considered an invasive in some states, and a 'useful native plant' in others. I do think they are wonderful to look at --- their blooms have a central pod whose shape fascinates me. Mysterious as its flower appears to me, Pond Lily attracts mainly flies as its pollinators -- that bothers me a little because I think the flowers have a nice spicy smell, and I don't like sharing a common taste with flies.
An affiliation with butterfiles or hummingbirds appeals to me more. I wasn't fortunate enough to catch a hummie in my lens, but with their frantic feeding and fornicating the butterfiles seemed utterly unaware of me. I waded breast deep in tall-stemmed flowers along the creek between Big Neebish and Raines, struggling to frame photos of glittery creatures who were so oblivious to me that they spoiled my pictures by brushing against my cheek or landing on my camera just as I had a view I liked. LV This is just one in a series of articles and photograph portfolios of Neebish Island. You're invited to subscribe to The NewsFEATHER (see the navigation bar, above left), so you won't miss the wildlife, the riverscapes, or the freighters. |