The first pea blossoms of 2009
Raspberry blossoms
Today I found the first raspberry blossoms. There are still just a few, but there seems to be a good crop of buds coming along. The raspberry blossoms are quite inconspicuous. You have to walk right up to the plants to see the flowers. The bees seem to have no trouble finding them, though.
Honeybee feeding on a Thornless Blackberry blossom
In contrast, blackberry flowers are much more showy. The flower’s big floppy white petals span a couple of inches. We grow four varieties of thornless blackberries. In this photo a honeybee is collecting from a flower. I also saw a number of bumblebees and small native bees in just a minute or so as I was taking photos today. All the bees are in constant motion. For me, capturing a good bee photo is a matter of taking enough photos so that I have a good chance at getting one I like.
Tomato blossoms
It’s exciting to see the first tomato blossoms. The first vine-ripened tomato is always a high point of the year. There are many great tomato varieties. Every year we trial a few varieties new to us, but we do have a list of favorites that would be hard to displace.
A pile of fresh-picked Black Locust blossoms
About 10 years ago, soon after we purchased the property, we planted Black Locust trees along part of our boundary fenceline. In the last week, I’ve heard several mentions of eating the blossoms from the Black Locust. Evert recently taught a workshop on foraging for wild edible plants, and told me that the Black Locust blossoms were the hit of the class. I had recently read similar mention from other sources, so I collected some blossoms this morning. I took this phot of my sample pile. The taste is interesting, kind of a floral pea or bean combination. They do have a bit of a crunch when you bite down. I gave out samples to seven people today. The response ranged from mildly interested to a polite “hmmmm.” Maybe we’ll try selling some in the farmstand, but it doesn’t look like Black Locust blossoms will be the crop that pays for our next tractor.
I took some photos of a beautiful deep blue delphinium, but I didn’t like any of the photos, so I’ll have to try again. We also have quite a bit of chamomile in bloom that I haven’t yet photographed. When I was writing about the inconspicuous raspberry flower, I was reminded that I could probably also get a photo of French sorrel going to seed. So, I’m already three blossoms behind, with lots more to come.
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