brookside gardens | Beautiful Flower Pictures Blog

Wild Columbine – Aquilegia canadensis

by hankinslawrenceimages | Dec 9, 2008 | Flowers, Wildflowers

On my trip to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park last April one of the wildflowers I photographed was Wild Columbine – Aquilegia canadensis. Columbine is a member of the Ranunculaceae family. It is easily identified – the flowers look like little lanterns.

I spotted the columbine growing along the side of the road. It was growing in and among several other wildflowers. Here’s a close up of just the flowers of the Columbine.

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Here is one of the columbine blossoms with some Meadow Parsnip (Thaspium).

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Here’s the grouping of wildflowers that was so striking. It’s a mix of the Columbine, Meadow Parsnip and Purple Phacelia (Phacelia binpinnatifida).

A few weeks after I got back from the Smokies, I was at Brookside Gardens in Wheaton, Maryland and spotted some columbine in one of the beds. It was interesting seeing how the columbine plant looks when it’s not mixed in with other wildflowers.

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Winter Gold Winterberry – Ilex Verticillata

by hankinslawrenceimages | Dec 1, 2008 | Flowers

On a recent trip to Brookside Gardens, I spotted several large bushes with clusters of orange berries on them. What was interesting was that there wasn’t just one or two clumps of berries on a branch – there were distinct groups of berries all the way down the branch. The little sign named them as the Winter Gold variety of Winterberry – Ilex Verticillata.

It turns out that Winterberry is a deciduos holly. Later in the year – it will lose all of it’s leaves, just leaving behind the berries. There are a several varieties of winterberry. I’ll keep an eye out for some of the other varieties in the local gardens and try to photograph them later in the winter.

In the meantime, here are a few photos of the Winter Gold Winterberry bush.

Spirit Frost Spider Flowers – Cleome Hassleriana

by hankinslawrenceimages | Nov 28, 2008 | Flowers

This summer, one of the flowers I photographed at Brookside Gardens in Wheaton, Maryland was an amazing Spider Flower. What caught my eye was the shape and all the gorgeous shades of pink.

The Spider Flower – Cleome hassleriana – is an annual plant. The plants are known for their long seed pods that give the flowers their distinctive shapes. The variety of Spider Flower I photographed is the Spirit Frost Spider Flowers.

Here’s the whole flower – the plant was between 2 and 3 feet tall.

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A close-up view of the petals and some of the seedpods

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And the flower from above

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Spider Flowers bloom all summer long – so I’ll keep an eye out for more varieties next summer in local gardens.

Ornamental Peppers at Brookside Gardens

by hankinslawrenceimages | Nov 19, 2008 | Flowers, Photo Locations, Solanaceae Family

This summer, the gardeners at Brookside Gardens in Wheaton, Maryland planted ornamental peppers around the sundial in the Trial Garden section of the gardens. The variety growing there this year was Capsicum Annuum – Garda Tricolore. The peppers – in all sorts of wonderful shades of red, yellow, orange and purple, grew on low plants that quickly spread to fill the area around the sundail.

Here are some of the photos of the peppers that I took in September.

Lion’s Ears and Snail Flowers

by hankinslawrenceimages | Nov 12, 2008 | Flowers

I spent several mornings photographing at Brookside Gardens in Wheaton, Maryland this summer and fall. When I head to Brookside, I never know what I’m going to find in bloom. Two flower I photographed recently got their common names from animals. Both were growing in the Fragrance Garden area at Brookside.

The first of the flowers is Leonotis Leonurus – commonly known as Lion’s Ears or Lion’s Tails. The only way to describe the Lion’s Ear flowers is that they are clusters of orange fuzzy flowers!

A few minutes after finding the Lion’s Ears – I looked up and saw some purple and white spiral flowers growing in clusters on a vines on the gazebo. It turns out they were Vigna Caracalla – commonly known as snail flowers.