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Friday, October 4, 2013

Life up Close, Moonflower Delight

When you are walking around, you really  never know what you will find.  As I prepared to leave a weekend retreat a few weeks ago, I was surprised by these first two and quickly snapped a shot of them both separately.  They happened to be on the same large rock, I'm still not sure if the first was lunch for the second!   With critters, I am not as close because I do not want to impose on their space but I was still fairly close enough.
 Praying Mantis, blending in nicely with the rock he was on.
A nice sized lizard on the other side of the rock from the Praying Mantis.  To me, he looks like he might be eyeballing lunch???


The last in the Life up Close mini series are these beautiful flowers.  They are called Moon Flowers
Moon flowers only open at night.  This bloom previously opened the night before so it is not as tightly closed, it is getting ready to open again as you will see below.
This is the side profile of the opened moon flower.  Though a bit out of focus, I left this shot so you could see the yet unopened buds on the right side of this photo.  For some reason my path has crossed with several Praying Mantis this year as you can see one was crawling on the moon flower in this shot.
This is the Moon Flower fully opened in all it's glory.  They are absolutely beautiful and I was so happy to see them on this evening.  My mom planted them and while visiting her she took me outside to see them.  What a treat :)  Wishing everyone a wonderful weekend!

2 comments:

Donna said...

I love finding critters and pretty plants when I least expect it..though I don't really like coming upon snakes without seeing them at a distance first,even if they are just harmless ones!

Ivy, Phyllis and Me! said...

Good Evening Amy, It is lovely to catch up with you. I have to say, I love your profile photograph, I keep thinking that I should change mine. Maybe I will ask one of my daughters to take a photograph when they come to stay at Christmas time.
The Moon flower is so very beautiful, isn't it amazing to see flowers which bloom only during the evening. We used to grow a cactus in Cyprus which produced the most beautiful flowers, but again only in the evening and by the following morning they had faded.
That lizard certainly had a twinkle in his eye, I hope the Praying Mantis managed to escape and didn't end up as a lunchtime treat.
Enjoy your day Amy,
Best Wishes to you,
Daphne