Best of 2020

     2020 began with Australia on fire, here is a map of the fires superimposed on North America, it would be like a fire that stretches from Saskatchewan to Florida and then some, I wondered if the Earth would get back at us???

An unusual satellite image from February, I guess it's not so unusual for the season just unusually symetrical, I believe we were having a seasonal winter at that time.

We're all in this together, unless you are so selfish that you think you deserve to travel for leisure, our Provincial government would find this out by next winter!!!

Spring eventually comes, creating a small lake at our local school yard.

Siberian Squill is the among the first spring blooms.

Some Kaufmanii type tulips in early spring.

Hepatica welcomes the spring.

Some species tulips and crocus.

Vinca or Periwinkle with it's tiny but pretty flower.

Two types of Muscari or Grape Hyacinth bloom mid spring.

The delicate blooms of Double Flowering Almond.

We spotted this wild Penstemon in our local dog park, it is native to Western North America and the only ones I have ever seen in our area.

Some double flowering tulips, they would be finished off by the hail in June!

Sunlight thru the trees in the frontyard, does this look like the Northern Plains?

One of my favourite photos of the year, evening sunlight on the muscari and tulip buds.

June hailstorm, came out of nowhere, would set off the early summer as stormy and destructive, I almost had a nervous breakdown.

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One of the few plants I bought was lobelia this year. I wanted to create a lobelia ball so used this old wire planter, some raindeer moss, wire and coleus cuttings for contrast, the first of a few photos, lets see how that grew...

The early summer was shaping up to be hot and wet, which is not a song from Prince believe it or not!

My neighbourhood is being inundated by new developments which means houses are torn down and yards are completely destroyed. When I see the fencing about to go up I try to rescue whatever I can, in this case I rescued this yellow globeflower Trollius and a bunch of these ferns. I also rescued some peony's the fall before, they are doing well but may not bloom for years yet.

This is what happened to my vegetable boxes, I replanted twice only to have them completly innundated by heavy rains and hail. I've never had such bad luck in my life, in the year I decided to have a garden show with the Horticultural Society!

Some purple iris

The Amur Cork tree after the hailstorm, I thought the worst but a few weeks later new leaves emerged like a miracle! Or just nature I guess!?

Cornus canadensis or Canada Dogwood is a nice groudcover for the shade.

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Spotted this on one of the river paths, uhh huh.

A Tyrannosaurus Rex made of scrap metal near the Science Centre sets off this dramatic Chinook Arch.

We had some fun submerging this peony in a glass bowl.

A little later on for the lobelia, yes I wanted to put all these photos together but I am dealing with new technology and lets just be happy we can even get the blog this far without a major problem right now!

New, Coal Seams Black Iris, I waited two or three years for this to bloom and then we had to put a tall stake nearby in case of a storm to put a bedsheet over it, geeze what a year!

A salute to the Calgary Stampede cancelled due to Covid 19 like everything everywhere!

New leaves burst forth on the Amur Cork

Google Lens helped me identify this Dog Vomit Mould, how great is nature and the people who have named it???

This native Prickly Pear bloomed only one year after being planted as a cutting!

Because of Covid the Schools did not mow the lawns but left them to the clover. I think this is an economical and ecologically friendly way to deal with all these fields. The bees love it and dandelions do not grow.

And a little later on, ball status achieved!

The Isabella double lily I found for 20 bucks at Home Depot! This is a new variety of double lily that does not have stamens or pollen, it is derived from a mutation and has only been available for a few years. I have planted it in the ground so we will see how it does in situ next year!

Another flower from my Mother-in-laws farm, a clustered bell flower, set off nicely with the brilliant green of Kentucky Coffee Tree.

Another one I had to indentify with an app, Wild Buckwheat, found on Tom Campbell Hill which is an area the city spent a lot of attention restoring to natural plant species, I have never seen this before!

My Ricinus pots enjoy the heat.

Oh and another one! It just gets better and better!

I tried growing some Papaya seeds, easy germination.

Found this Tiger Eyes Sumac on sale for only 7 dollars so thought it needed a good home.

More Isabella Lilies, bloomed for several weeks, also fragrant!

The Datura did very well in this new bed, several blooms a day.

A Gypsy Moth caterpillar, I used to love throwing these at my sister. You cannot imagine how concerned a Border Collie could be over a thing like this, I eventually got him to a safe area.

An American Goldfinch, apparently we are well within their range but I have never seen one in Calgary before, I also saw a Mountain Blue Bird earlier this year another species I haven't seen before but we apparently have, who knew?

El Desperado daylily, it means The Desperado!

Also new this year, Queenie Lime Orange Zinnia, yep its orange! I think I would like Queenie Lime Red better and now I have so many seeds! Oh boi!

Hope For Humanity Rose, never lets us down, this plant is only a few years old and now you know why it is my favourite for our zone!

Double Purlple Datura, I grew these in pots and when they were about to bloom we had to take them on a  10 hour car ride to Saskatchewan or else we would miss them! I grew them from seed and was not going to miss this!

Also new was Peruvian Black Mint or Hucate (tall plant in centre), is a tall relative of the marigold and is eaten in Latin America. It has all the benefits of marigold such as repelling bad insects and nematoads. It grew surpringly well in Calgary and I will definitly grow it again.

Double Datura looks like an alien

I took a few photos of this bee at the Cerinthe flower, this one turned out well.

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When we have a hot year ants will enter their reproduction phase by growing wings and flying away to make a new nest, there can be a lot hatching all in one area and since we are surrounded by school fields...

hundreds of seagulls take wing and eat as many flying ants as they can.

All of the Cockscomb I grew were wiped out earlier in the year so I took the remaining seeds I had and started them again in late June, by late summer they had become quite rewarding, see, never give up! That's me, Mr Optimist!

I have known about this Horse Chestnut for a few years near my neighbourhood and noticed it had grown some nuts so....

I will try growing some of course!

We don't usually grow chilis very well but our extended summer was all they needed.

I haven't grown sunflowers in many years as squirells usually devastate them and my emotions are devastated with them, however, since there are more dogs and a few cats in all our backyards this situation has changed over the years. 

One day I had a detour and spotted this Honey Locust on a boulevard in Bridgeland, did the City plant it? It's great I hope we see more, there is no reason we are not planting these beautiful trees all over!

Some Cottonwoods by the river on a spectacular fall day.

Some sunflowers in my neighbourhood.

This year was so warm well into October that the Engleman Ivy even turned red, a rarity in our city!

Some of the tomato crop this year. Varieties like Think Pink, Yellow Cherry, Lucky Tiger and  Lemon Boy.

Kentucky Coffee Tree turned yellow before dropping all it's leaves one day at once.

Two large tomatos from the garden, we did not have frost until mid October this year and the results were pretty great!

The full moon on Halloween which was actually a blue moon and the first time this has happened on Halloween since 1944! I played some playlists of 1940's music outside for any ghosts out there who may have returned for whatever reason.

After a mid October cold spell with snow the weather returned to crazy warm again.

And this was happening, Rachael Maddow has some fun on TV, we deserved it!

In December more warm weather, we were tied or just were about to beat long warm spells for the month in history.

Putting up Christmas lights and stuff in early December, so nice, I was in shorts a few days!

And then, WHAM! Huge snowstorm, breaking many records, causing chaos but so close to Christmas f***ing magical!!!

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I always pass this boulder which looks like a dinosaur head so I drew this in the snow.

8 days below freezing in December.

A magical Christmas night with the moon

The Great Conjunction of 2020! Jupiter and Saturn haven't been this close and observable since 1226. We have a conjunction like this every 20 years but it is not always visible to us on Earth. I can't believe my camera caught this and we were lucky enough to have one clear day just before they were the closest, the next night was the giant snowstorm.

A fitting sign of the times and ending to 2020.

So much snow we made trails for the dog in the backyard! Happy New Year!