Oh well. I sucked up as much fresh air, sunshine - pollen - birds & flowers as I could up to now.
Have lived in Fair Oaks for 15 years and only this week discovered there is a park only a mile or so from my house that has an area set aside for Vernal Pools in Phoenix Field. The park is sandwiched between a Little League field, parking lots, and loads of residential homes. It is amazing the natural Vernal Pools there survived at all. Unlike Mather Field & its Vernal Pools, which is a bit further away, this Phoenix Park doesn't allow visitors to tromp on the pool areas so it looks so... pristine.
Mind, the rainbow doesn't last forever - in a couple of months these flowery fields will look dead as a doornail - all withered, brown and stark. That's part of the Vernal Pool ecology, so gotta see 'em while they're HOT - in a pretty flower sort of way.
Here's flowers I've been enjoying staring at this past month or so.
These next few flowers I can still find out in pasture land. They're not necessarily associated with Vernal Pools. The first is Valley Tassel, or Slender Owl's Clover.
This next one I found growing all over rocks in a field. They're tiny suculents, and they cling to rocks like lichens. Close up they are rather pretty, like tiny golden starbursts.
Ooo! Check out the Stonecrop here... you see it growing on the rocks in the foreground, and all that yellow in the distance is more of it growing like a golden crust on rock outcroppings.
My mother would have LOVED this stuff! Here's yet another look at Sierra Stonecrop or it's other name, Dwarf Cliff Sedum.
So about now you're thinking I've forgotten about my feathered homies. As if!
