Cap'n Bob & the Damsel

May 2014

Arizona Sun

Arizona Sun

I took photos yesterday of some flowers on display outside the little department store on the west side. The one depicted above is a drought-tolerant variety of daisy called “Arizona Sun” (Asteraceae Gaillardia). According to several on-line sources, this flower attracts butterflies and after the flower petals fall off, they attract goldfinches.

Dave’s Garden has this additional information about this colorful flower:

Sun Exposure:
Full Sun

Bloom Color:
Red
Red-Orange
Bright Yellow

Bloom Time:
Mid Summer
Late Summer/Early Fall
Mid Fall
Blooms repeatedly

Foliage:
Herbaceous

Other details:
This plant is attractive to bees, butterflies and/or birds
Average Water Needs; Water regularly; do not overwater
Self-sows freely; deadhead if you do not want volunteer seedlings next season

Click on the image to enlarge.

20 May 2014 by Arizona Flowers Home & Garden Photography

Arizona Queen of the Night Flower Buds


Not unsurprisingly, the Arizona Queen of the Night cactus on the west side of the lot has developed three flower buds. One is quite prominent at this time, with two smaller buds in the offing. To highlight the three buds, roll your mouse cursor over the image above.

Last year, we had three beautiful flowers open on this little cactus and now we are expecting three more. There is another Queen in our back yard up on the hill, but it is in a place where I would be unsure of myself hiking up there after dark to photograph the flowers. If the flowers last until morning light, we may be able to get photos of them as well.

19 May 2014 by Arizona Flowers Home & Garden

Spring Flower Show


Today was grocery shopping day. After getting home and putting the groceries away, we decided to take a little ride around town so I could get some photos of the desert spring flowers currently in abundance. This is a Spring flower slideshow. Click on the image to advance through the following flowers and things:

  • Saguaro Flower
  • Cleveland Sage Flower Cluster
  • Red Bird of Paradise (Pride of Barbados)
  • Yellow Prickly Pear Flower
  • Agave Flower Stalk
  • Pink Cholla Flower
  • Devil’s Tongue Barrel Cactus Flower
15 May 2014 by Arizona Flowers Photography

ISS HD Earth Viewing Experiment

Southeast Asia

This is an interesting thing to watch live streaming from the International Space Station. It is a high definition view of the Earth below taken from one of four HD cameras aboard the ISS. I screen captured the image above of somewhere over Southeast Asia as the ISS sailed off to the south pacific. Read the entire description of the experiment at APOD.

This is a good site to find out the current location of the ISS. Click on the image to enlarge.

UPDATE: I watched the streaming video as the ISS approached the terminator and was surprised to see the full moon rising in the distance.

Full Moon Rising

UPDATE II: This is looking back at the setting moon at about 1815UTC 5/16/2014 as the ISS passed into western Canada.

Moonset

Click on the images to enlarge.

14 May 2014 by Aerospace Astronomy Rocket Science

Coming Soon – Pride of Barbados Flowers

Flower Pods

The Pride of Barbados (a.k.a. Red Bird of Paradise) shrubs in the courtyard are coming up much faster than they did last year. This stem’s flower pods will likely be opening very soon, about a month earlier than last year.

Neither of the other two Red Bird shrubs have any flower pods. This shrub has this almost fully developed pod stem and another tiny one that will be coming along soon. This shrub was the last one to have flowers a year ago. My, how things seem to change from year to year.

All three shrubs were installed in June of 2011, so this is their third spring/summer in the courtyard. Click on the image to enlarge.

13 May 2014 by Arizona Flowers Home & Garden Photography

Hashtag Diplomacy

Hashtag Diplomacy

Cartoon and this excerpt from The Patriot Post:

#BringBackOurGirls Rhetoric

Political commentator George Will blasted the White House’s response to the kidnappings in Nigeria and had this to say about Michelle Obama’s #BringBackOurGirls twitter promo. “Are these barbarians in the wilds of Nigeria supposed to check their Twitter accounts and say, ‘Uh oh, Michelle Obama is very cross with us — we better change our behavior’?” he asked. “It’s an exercise in self-esteem. I do not know how adults stand there, facing a camera, and say, ‘Bring back our girls.'” Of course, we don’t understand how Democrats can stand in front of the camera to exploit every mass shooting, either. Will added, “Power is the ability to achieve intended effects, and this [social media campaign] is not intended to have any effect on the real world.” Michelle delivered a speech on the situation over the weekend, but her remarks excluded any reference to Boko Haram or Islam. #ProfilesInCourage

We note that political cartoonist Gary McCoy has comically exaggerated every feature of the first couple EXCEPT for the first lady’s BUTT!

12 May 2014 by Beltway Kabuki Humor Whacko Politics

Mothers Day 2014

Beavertail Cactus Flower

Happy Mothers Day!

We noticed that a new flower opened on one of the beavertail cacti in my rock and cactus garden today. It is very unusual for a flower to open this late in spring. All of the other beavertails in our garden stopped getting flowers several weeks ago. I guess this one is a special flower just for Mothers Day. Click on the image to enlarge.

11 May 2014 by Arizona Flowers Holidays Photography

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