I am a primatologist who spends twelve hours most days in the company of a thirteen year old chimpanzee named Bow. I am also an editor with Inverted-A Press.
It is raining again now, but after the last rain, there was a short respite, and I went back out and looked at the flowers.
Service berries by the fence line
After the rain, in that strange light that lingers in the air, everything looks greener, even the service berries by the pasture fence.
apple blossoms against a cloudy sky
The blossoms on the new apple tree all seemed to be opening at once.
apple blossoms close up
It was hard to capture a clear picture of each blossom, because they would not stand still. The branches of the new apple tree were towering up into the sky and swaying in the breeze.
apple branches swaying in the breeze
But where were the bees? Didn't they want to take advantage of the opening apple blossoms? No. They had all gone to call on the Weigela blooms by the woods.
The Weigela blossoms, more numerous that the apple blooms, and just as pretty, drew my entire bee population into their midst.
a bee comes to call on a Weigela bloom
The bees were so confused by the embarrassment of riches before them that they flitted too quickly from flower to flower to flower.
Which Weigela blossom is best? Which is the prettiest? Which offers the sweetest nectar? It is very hard for me to tell, and gauging by the bees' reactions, they don't know, either. Every one is beautiful in its own way -- and they are very hard to tell apart!
Confession: Bow and I don't know much about botany. We are not that good at identifying plants. My friend Kathy was here the other day, and she told me at once that those flowering trees by the woods were not Bartlett pears. She was not sure what they were, but not that. Later we found out they were service berry, also known as shadbush, also known as wild pear or chuckley pear. Their scientific name is amelanchier arboria.
Luckily, Kathy brought us a small gift when she came, a book called Trees of Missouri. We have been studying up.
The service berry does give fruit, and the berries do look a little like very small pears. I am going to watch it fruit this year and see if I can pick some before the birds get it all. The tree does not get very tall usually, though it has been known to reach a maximum of thirty feet, which in my opinion is quite tall enough. I have it growing in my pasture as well as near the woods.
In other news, it rained last night, and before the rain, there was a lot of wind. Bow was outside when it started to storm, and he did not want to seem to retreat before the aggression of nature, so he put on a lot of displays before he discreetly went inside, under cover of bluster.
I left the pea plants outside to enjoy the rain, and this morning they are in the act of trying to climb the grid.
The plant has already attempted this once before, and Bow tore it from its moorings by moving the pot when I was not looking. Now the tendrils are gingerly reaching out again.
Bow and the pea plants have an uneasy truce. Bow tolerates their existence, but he is not overly protective of them.
The natural chimpanzee attitude toward food giving plants is to exploit, not nurture them. It is also the human way, because, after all, we are not so different.
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