Flowers Archives - Page 2 of 9 - Susan Brandt Graham Photography

May 5, 2019May 5, 2019

Late Afternoon in the Garden

Although my favorite time to photograph flowers in my garden is morning, when it is light but the sun hasn’t yet risen above the Sandias, yesterday the light was pretty good in late afternoon.

Did you watch the Kentucky Derby? I think it was the strangest one of my lifetime. When all is said and done, I’m glad none of the horses were injured.

Once the winner had been decided, I went out to see what was happening in the yard. Because the light in my small Albuquerque yard is very different in late afternoon than in early morning, I saw different things to photograph.

Lizard

A lot of lizards live in my yard. I rarely photograph them, partly because they run away. This guy was comfortable and held his ground.

Shrub Rose ‘Pike’s Peak’

This rose was a gift several years ago. I should have photographed it a couple of days earlier. However, you can still see the beauty it adds to the garden. I was heading out to photograph it when I saw the lizard on the railroad ties.

Developing Baby Pear

I have two pear trees: one is a pollinator and the other produces good eating pears. This now-small pear should become a good eating pear some time in August.

Floribunda Rose, ‘Chihuly’

This rose pretty much speaks for itself.

Today is Cinco de Mayo, observed just for fun by many people. Today might be a good day to spend late afternoon in the garden… Enjoy whatever you do today. 🙂

May 4, 2019May 4, 2019

Garden Flowers This Week

Garden flowers are delightful, especially when they survive Albuquerque’s spring winds. These flowers are blooming this week and have maintained pretty good shape. The hybrid tea rose, ‘Gemini,’ is blooming (the first HT to bloom), but shows what wind can do to rose petals. Above all today, I’m showing some survivors in the high desert…

Cinnamon Delight

First is the unusually colored ‘Cinnamon Delight.’ I grow this in a container on my patio. It blooms almost nonstop from early spring until a hard freeze in the fall.

Climbing Earthquake

Next is the miniature rose, ‘Climbing Earthquake.’ Ralph Moore, hybridizer of many roses (mainly miniatures) hybridized this lively little beauty.

Spring Fling

Marmalade Skies

The floribunda rose, ‘Marmalade Skies,’ can produce very large sprays of roses as well as well-formed single blooms. Sprays are developing. Maybe in a week or two I’ll have some pictures of those.

Pansies

You know I’ll show pansies when they are blooming. 🙂

Autumn Sage

Autumn Sage requires very little care in the high desert. Hummingbirds, especially the females, it seems, prefer it over the hummingbird feeders.

BeBop

I cannot keep from smiling when ‘BeBop’ is blooming. I also laugh about the time a photographer who didn’t know roses (“you have to grow them to know them”) told me I should have waited until the wind stopped blowing to photograph a similar bloom. The petals grow this way, and to a great extent are how it got its name.

I hope you have a great week enjoying the garden flowers where you are. 🙂

April 27, 2019

First Rose and Pets

First Rose of 2019

The first rose in my yard in 2019 is the miniature rose ‘Child’s Play.’ This rose often has perfect form and overall general health. Other roses are about to bloom, but this one made it first.

Pets

These images are from last year. I never got them posted. This seemed like as good a time as any… All the pets belong to the Prices. Many of you will recognize Spunk. But first is a parrot, who can come out with some pretty funny things when he is listening to people in another room. He is rather shy in person, but one day let me make a few images. He is quite handsome.

Spunk, the perfect photographer’s model: handsome, loves to pose when he is in the mood.

Here, Spunk the model:

“OK, that’s enough. I’m bored now…”

Spring seems to have really arrived, and everything seems about to bloom. Enjoy what promises to be a beautiful weekend.

April 21, 2019

Spring Blooms

On this weekend of many different celebrations, religious observances, and good weather, is there a better time to celebrate spring blooms? Probably any time flowers are blooming is a good time to celebrate them. I photographed these in my yard this weekend.

Here in the high desert roses are beginning to have buds. However, they will not bloom for a few more weeks. Therefore I have planted flowers that bloom earlier – and later – than roses.

‘Nelly Moser’ is a well-known clematis that grows up one of favorite roses, ‘Mermaid.’ The rose provides good support for the clematis. In addition, it provides shade for the roots. The two coexist quite happily.

Earlier this year I showed some blooms of the dwarf peach, ‘Bonanza.’ The peaches are now forming. You can see how many tiny peaches are packed onto the branches. If I want good-sized peaches and healthy branches, I must thin these out this week. Otherwise, the peaches would be very small, and so many could weigh down the branches.

Pansies are remarkable flowers. They grow well all through autumn, go dormant in the colder parts of winter, and joyously burst forth in spring. They come in so many different colors. Each bloom seems to have its own expression.

The weekend has been beautiful in Albuquerque. Wishing you a beautiful week wherever you are.

March 25, 2019

Spring Flowers on a March Morning

Spring flowers are everywhere around town this week. The temperatures have warmed considerably.

Neighborly Dog

First, however, my neighbors’ dogs, Sampson and Inoki, greeted me this morning, as they always do. Sampson decided this would be the day he would try posing.

This is the first time Sampson has allowed me to get a full picture of him. His ears are like that, not back because he is unhappy. He and his brother Inoki are really sweet dogs.

Pansies

Now, to spring flowers…Around this time in March my pansies begin to wake up. Within about two weeks they will be overflowing their containers. For now I am happy with a few bright faces here and there.

Pear Buds

Bradford pears are blooming all over town. I do not know what my pears trees are. They were here when I bought the house. But, they bloom much later than the Bradford pears. One produces pears that people enjoy. The other is the required pollinator. It produces small hard pears loved by birds but not people. Works out perfectly… My pears are only in bud today, but some will have fully open blooms by the weekend.

Dwarf Peach ‘Bonanza’

The dwarf peach ‘Bonanza’ is at peak bloom today. It has been spectacular this year. If we don’t have a hard freeze later, I should get peaches this year. If I thin them, I will get good sized peaches. If I do not thin them, the branches will become weighted down with small peaches that make lovely spiced peaches (canned) for the holidays. But, for now, I’m enjoying the beauty!

Finally, thanks for taking a stroll through my yard and looking at some spring flowers and a neighborly dog.

March 20, 2019

Colorful Crocus

With more sun and warmer days, the different colors of crocus are all blooming. In my yard, the yellow ones always bloom first. But, with increasing light and warming temperatures, all the different variations are showing up.

These are some that brightened my day. I hope they brighten yours, too.

March 16, 2019

Orchid

This phalaenopsis orchid came from Costco two and a half years ago. I did not know what to expect from it, it just looked like fun. This is the third bloom for this plant, and I know next to nothing about orchids – except that this one makes me smile. 🙂 It isn’t particularly attractive. I picked it for the unusual color. In the time that I have had it, I have become particularly fond of “the orchid angel” of each bloom. This is actually made up of three parts, the column (the part that looks like a head), the throat (the part that looks like the arms), and the lip (the part that looks like the body).

I hope this gives you a smile today, too.

March 8, 2019

Crocus, a Sign of Spring

Crocus, early blooming bulbs, are a welcome sign of approaching Spring. January and February weren’t particularly bad, except for three little storms that left a lot of ice. But, the temperatures have warmed somewhat now. Of course, the usual sign of Spring here in Desert Southwest,the wind, is here in full force. Sunday we return to Daylight Savings Time.

Some of those signs of Spring bring mixed reactions.

But who cannot help but smile at the sight of bright little crocus appearing almost overnight out of the earth to welcome the coming season of rebirth here in the Northern Hemisphere?

October 14, 2018

New Mexico Roses: A Change Is Gonna Come

New Mexico Roses: a change is definitely coming to the High Southwest Desert this weekend. The first cold front of the season is arriving in New Mexico, with unseasonably low temperatures and snow in some areas. This is a little early. The cold will not last long. But if the temperatures drop low enough, most of the roses will be close to the end for 2018. In this time of change, I offer a look back at some of the roses growing in New Mexico gardens, some mine and some of friends. All of these were photographed out of doors, as growing, in natural light. I groomed some of those in my garden. I did not groom roses growing elsewhere. You would not find those entered in a rose show. “It’s not what you look at, it’s what you see.” I saw beauty in all of these.

From My Garden

From the Garden of Friends

Change is on its way. I hope you have enjoyed a stroll through some New Mexico gardens with their roses. I have certainly enjoyed sharing them with you.

August 19, 2018

Garden Delights

Garden Delights

Garden delights are plentiful and varied at this time of year. These are a few images from this past week.

First, Spunk Price surveying his garden and activity in it from the deck:

Next, a few flowers from my garden:

Cosmos, loved by butterflies, bees, hummingbirds, and goldfinches, among others:

Mermaid, an Old Garden Rose and favorite of many pollinators:

garden delights rose mermaid — Old Garden Rose, Mermaid

Floribunda rose, Fabulous!

garden delights rose floribunda — Fabulous!

Finally, Spunk Price, “OK enough for this Sunday. Time for a nap…”

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Lizard

Shrub Rose ‘Pike’s Peak’

Developing Baby Pear

Floribunda Rose, ‘Chihuly’

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Cinnamon Delight

Climbing Earthquake

Spring Fling

Marmalade Skies

Pansies

Autumn Sage

BeBop

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First Rose of 2019

Pets

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Neighborly Dog

Pansies

Pear Buds

Dwarf Peach ‘Bonanza’

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Orchid

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Crocus, a Sign of Spring

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New Mexico Roses: A Change Is Gonna Come

From My Garden

From the Garden of Friends

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Garden Delights

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