blooms from York to Scotchfort

My bike just had a tune-up, and I decided to test it out.  So I rode the 2 km to the Confederation Trail, and cycled on and on through fields and woods.  I saw robins, red-winged blackbirds, gold finches, and I heard many more.  And the wild flowers are in full force.

Within 6 weeks, these white blackberry flowers will morph into lucious fruit on prickly stems 

that will make me work hard to pick every berry.

Bunchberry flowers will produce fiery orange berries that are not edible to us humans.

These big balls of fluff look like giant dandelions.

The forest opens to reveal a bog of blueberries and other plants.

In the bog is another type of fuzzy seed head held high above grassy leaves.

 A fragrant wild rose along the path.

Blue flag iris in the bog.

A huge variety of ferns grow in the shade of trees along the trail.  

This is cinnamon fern (note brown fronds),

This fern seems to like more sun.

Delicate feathery ferns lead to a resting spot along the trail.  

Now if only the mosquitoes would lay off when I get off my bike!

This looks like a type of wild azalea. 

Grayish-white lichen carpets a small section along the trail.  

I've never seen this plant anywhere else.

2 km from my house is where I get to the trail, where I start at km 183.  This is near km 200, a beautiful way to end the trip, with a view of the Hillsborough River.  Now all I have to do is cycle back 20 km.  Oh - my poor legs, and my poorer seat!  This is going to hurt for a while.

 On the exhausting way back, I stopped to pick a few wild strawberries, and a tiny bright butterfly landed on my thumb.  As I looked at it closely, it seemed to be sucking up the salty sweat on my finger.  It stayed on my finger for a long time, and I struggled to take pictures of it with one hand. When the mosquitoes became impossible to bear, I finally gently shook it off, and it flew right back and landed on my thumb again.

I finally convinced my friend to check out the wild strawberries.

During my 4 hours on a sunny perfect day, I met only one other person using this trail.

We Islanders don't know how lucky we are here on PEI to enjoythis beautiful, free way to enjoy nature.  I hope more people get out and discover the beauty all around us.

peony power

Peonies bloom for such a short time - three weeks max. And they attract ants.  and the double ones need to be staked or they will droop to the ground with the first rain weighing down the big heavy blooms.  But they sure are beautiful.  And they smell wonderful.

I discovered the perfect peony for me - single flowers.  They are very hard to find - almost no one sells these.  But the flowers have just one layer of petals, are light as a feather, and don't need to be staked.  So I think they are great.

Thesse beauties have delicate petals, are full of bees, so they are great addition to the natural landscape.  Just one thing - they have no fragrance, which is a bit disappointing.

Here is a lovely pink single called "Dancing Butterflies"

A gardening friend started 72 peonies from seed.  Seven years later, she has a long row of single-flowering peonies, and has now decided she doesn't like them as well as the doubles.  So she offered me as many as I could carry away.  This is not the ideal time to transplant peonies (the rule is to transplant before or after blooming, not during) but she wanted rid of them, so I just appreciated the gift. I stacked the big plants in the passenger seat, the trunk and the back seat of the car.  It looked like I was taking the flowers for a ride!  After finding a home for each in my flower beds, I cut off all the flowers.  It's hard enough for a plant to become established after being moved without supporting flowers as well.  Most definitely the plants will suffer a set-back, and probably won't bloom for the next few years, but it will be a lovely surprize when they finally do.