Hearts-a-bursting

"Hearts-a-bursting" or strawberry bush or Euonymus americanus is the Botany Photo of the Day for today November 19, 2008 at the UBC Botanical Garden and Centre for Plant Research out of Vancouver, British Columbia in Canada. It is a wonderful site full of plant information and beautiful botanical photos. You can even sign up here to have the Botany Photo of the Day emailed to you. It is inspiring to see all the beautiful pictures of plants plus you learn a bit about each plant that is featured as well. It is a site not to be missed by lovers of plants and all things green.

Perhaps it is inpiring enough to encourage you to take your camera out in the garden or on walks with you. Refer to your camera's user manual to see if it has a setting for close-up pictures. My camera has a little flower icon next to the button that will put it into "macro mode" or in other words set it so it can focus on close-up subjects. Here is an easy to understand article from DIY on taking botanical pictures to get you started. Google will also be able to get you even more information if you search for something like "camera macro."


Hopefully you've enjoyed some of my botanical photographs that have been sprinkled through this blog and the Rochester Civic Garden Center's webpages - including the picture above. The above picture is of common toadflax, Linaria vulgaris, or my favorite name for it, butter-and-eggs. Although most who are not herbalists consider it an alien weed, it is a gorgeous photo subject. It's not a weed to me. I love their late summer color and ability to grow in the leanest and driest waste places on my property. Just how could you hate that?

-kim