Enchanting Essex

Tag: nature

  • Wildflower Wednesdays – #1 Daisies

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    Terri Webster Schrandt recently launched The Flower Hour photo challenge on October 7, 2025, after it was discovered that Cee Neuner closed her blog permanently.  Cee Neuner was the originator of Flower of the Day (FOTD) photo challenge and posted the challenge all 7 days of the week. After our beloved friend and amazing photographer…

  • The Flower Hour #32 – Dogwood Delight

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    The Flower Hour #32: Going to the Dog-Woods This week’s prompt makes me positively euphoric — it is one of only a very few (so far?) when I have actually had some images of Terri’s chosen flower.  I’d have shared a picture of me doing my happy dance but I’d have surely frightened everyone away! Here…

  • Lens-Artists Challenge #399: Stuck in Place – The Angels of Kingsville

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    You cannot get through a single day without having an impact on the world around you. What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.†  The Challenge:  …let’s get stuck in one place. Ideally, you should carve out thirty minutes to an hour to do…

  • Essex Erato #15

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    Young Bismark Standing on the steps,delicacy in his grasp,hungry but wary. But in every walk with Nature one receives far more than he seeks.† ’Til next time, y’all… †John Muir, “Steep Trails” — Page 1343, Chapter IX Mormon Lilies from his anthology “John Muir: Ultimate Collection”.

  • Essex Erato #14

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    Epaulets Caterwauling voice.Polygamous and brash thisblack and red devil. But in every walk with Nature one receives far more than he seeks.† ’Til next time, y’all… †John Muir, “Steep Trails” — Page 1343, Chapter IX Mormon Lilies from his anthology “John Muir: Ultimate Collection”.

  • Essex Erato #13

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    Temporary Habitat Snow melts and ponds form —springtime’s home for dabbling ducks.Duckling watch begins. But in every walk with Nature one receives far more than he seeks.† ’Til next time, y’all… †John Muir, “Steep Trails” — Page 1343, Chapter IX Mormon Lilies from his anthology “John Muir: Ultimate Collection”.

  • Essex Erato #12

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    Jonathan Crasher of picnics,contriving to look, at once,hopeful and aloof. But in every walk with Nature one receives far more than he seeks.† ’Til next time, y’all… †John Muir, “Steep Trails” — Page 1343, Chapter IX Mormon Lilies from his anthology “John Muir: Ultimate Collection”.

  • Project 365 – #21

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    I’ve been encouraged to link my flower posts so, fingers crossed, here goes: Spring Festival 2026: Week #9~Buttercup Field Floral Friday – Last days in the garden using the tripod for my flowers The Flower Hour #31: Local Lilacs and Lupine ‘Til next time, y’all…

  • The Flower Hour #31:  Lilac is more than a flower…

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    My trusty friend, The OED, tells me that the colour “lilac” is a moderate to pale grayish-purple or a light purplish-pink.  With apologies to Terri, our Lilacs have finished here in southern Ontario, and the only Lupins I know of are in the Monty Python sketch “Dennis Moore” —  “Give me all your Lupins!” —…

  • Lens-Artists Challenge #398: Choose A Colour

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    You may share one photo featuring each of the following captivating colors in their various shades: red, blue, green, purple, orange, and yellow. Nature always wears the colors of the spirit.† And never is that more apparent than in the world of wildflowers. Thank you to Ritva for designing such an interesting, interpretive, and creative…

  • Lens Artist Challenge #397: Texture — Touch Comes Before Sight*

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    Lens Artist Challenge #397: Texture This week Anne is inspiring us with this challenge: How do we make our two-dimensional medium feel like three-dimensions? Texture, however, gives us the visual quality of a surface — how rough, smooth, gritty, or soft it appears in a two-dimensional image. Show us your images where texture plays an integral part.  Texture…

  • Glorious Gooses

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    Canada Gooses are majestic. Barrel-chested.The envys of all ornithologys.† This post is inspired by an article in today’s papers:    Ontario man fined $1,000 for ‘throwing large rocks and swatting’ at Canada geese It is the story of a cruel and ignorant resident of my beloved Essex County who, first caught a gosling, and then…

  • Essex Erato #11

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    Flicker handsomely moustachedflitting around the forestbeauty in the sky But in every walk with Nature one receives far more than he seeks.† †John Muir, “Steep Trails” — Page 1343, Chapter IX Mormon Lilies from his anthology “John Muir: Ultimate Collection”.

  • The Flower Hour #29:  Vis Medicatrix Naturæ* 

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    Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees.2 Tramping through the woods at Wheatley Provincial Park yesterday, nature’s peace did indeed flow into me and, happily, there were windflowers galore! Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where Nature may heal and cheer and give…

  • Lens-Artists Challenge # 396 – Pick a Favourite Quote and Illustrate it

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    This week you can choose one quote accompanied with a maximum of five pictures or a maximum of five quotes illustrated with one picture each. Make us “feel”your quote(s) in pictures! Annie Dillard: “Today is one of those excellent January partly cloudies in which light chooses an unexpected part of the landscape to trick out…

  • The Flower Hour #28:  In The Ripples of the Water

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    First and always, thank you so much to the wonderful Terri for continuing this most enjoyable weekly prompt.  Nothing makes me happier than to see the beautiful floral images posted by everyone!  Please check out Terri’s post- as always, it’s very interesting, and her pictures are exquisite: The Flower Hour #28: Flowers in Water I apologize…

  • Lens-Artists Challenge #395 — On the Water:  Liquid Lapse of Thought*

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    Lens Artists Photo Challenge #395 – Looking back to #151 On the Water Some of my favourite creatures to photograph live in shallow water habitats — ponds, creeks and, my favourite, marshes.  Wearing my water shoes, I’m not averse to mucking about in those areas, but my entire world changed when I got my kayak.…

  • The Flower Hour #26: Lucky Flower Shots – Lucky Me

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    You know what luck is?  Luck is believing you’re lucky.† Yesterday was meant to be my first solo outing of the spring.  We’ve established a very nice little routine for those days, Cam and I:  He drives to the golf club and leaps out (actually, at our ages, “leap” is the tiniest of exaggerations), I…

  • Lens-Artists Challenge #393 — Lucky Shot

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    I struggled with this challenge.  Come to think of it, I’ve written that same sentence with regards to a few of these challenges and I’ve not even been doing them all that long.  In many respects, I think mine is an appropriate reaction — it is a challenge, after all… My first photography teacher (Dad)…

  • The Flower Hour #23:  Phorest Phloxy Phlorals*

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    The Flower Hour #23: Spring’s Phloxy Florals Thanks as always to Terri for another Flower Hour reminder.  She chose Phlox this week and — ta da — this is actually a flower I have in my collection.   Here in south-west Ontario, and especially at Point Pelee National Park, we have a species of wild…

  • The Flower Hour #22 — Trilliums

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    Here in Ontario, nothing says “Spring” like Trilliums!  After all, ever since 1937, the White Trillium (Trillium grandiflorum) has been the official flower and floral emblem of our province, and a stylised Trillium is our provincial logo: Wandering into the woods and finding the floor carpeted with beautiful white, pink and dark red blossoms is…

  • Unwinding With The Critters

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    Lens Artists Challenge #389: Time to Relax But what relaxes you? What gets you away from the stresses of daily life. What’s your passion?† On any given day, I’m probably the most stressed-out person you’ll meet.  Relaxation (without stress) doesn’t typically come easily to me but answering Anne’s questions was easy.  A leisurely rural ramble through…

  • Flower Hour #19 – The perfume strong I love!

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    The Flower Hour #19: Almond Tree Blossoms Here in Ontario’s deep south, where spring is teasing us but hasn’t yet arrived, I’m longing for the early blossoms that never fail to thrill. One of my favourites is the Lilac, and one of the best-ever locations to view them here in Essex County is at the…

  • Insects are Interesting

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    I grew up in a childhood idyll;  beside my house was an enormous wild meadow.  Technically, it was a Hydro Right-of-Way, but it was an unspoiled field with long grasses, wildflowers galore and — especially appealing to us kiddos, bugs galore.  It was in that field that my love of wildflowers was born and too,…

  • Anserine Astonishment

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    Lens Artists Photo Challenge #384 – What Astonishes You? This lovely challenge was created by Beth of Wandering Dawgs: “What have you seen or experienced that has astonished you? The challenge is to include photos about things that astonish you and tell us why you are astonished.  I got the inspiration for this challenge from these…