Thursday, July 22, 2021

NOT KANSAS

The Sunflower State, although we'll be there in a couple of weeks. Mrs. C and I went on an excursion yesterday to an out-of-the-way corner of the suburbs, tucked behind the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers. In one of the few good works of our benighted state government, the Missouri Department of Conservation maintains the Columbia Bottom Conservation Area, https://mdc.mo.gov/discover-nature/places/columbia-bottom-conservation-area, bottoms in the sense of river bottomland. It has planted 14 fields of sunflowers, staggered to bloom in sequence through the summer. Quite a sight.

The only issue with these pictures is the haze from the Oregon fires a half-continent away. This picture has been heavily edited in Photoshop and still lacks something, in my opinion.                

5 comments:

William Kendall said...

They are a lovely sight. Sunflowers here blossom in August and into September.

Stefan Jansson said...

A fine wide-angle view of the sunflower field.

susie @ persimmon moon cottage said...

The picture you took of thee sun flowers is so pretty, acres and acres of them are wonderful to see.

I can't believe how much that smoke is visible to us here in St Louis. The color of the sky is really dulled by the smoke and all of the flowers in my flower bed look a bit dusty, more so than normal, I wonder if very, very fine bits of ash from the fires are settling on our plants.

A couple of nights ago (I can't remember now which night it was). I stuck my head out of the front door to see if anything was going on. It was about 3 am. (My husband and I are night owls). There was a very light breeze blowing and I could smell the very, very, light scent of burning leaves. It was not the scent of fire pits, or other kinds of smoke. It was a very light scent of burning leaves. It hit me that I was probably smelling the smoke from the huge fires so far away. It was so faint that it was almost like smelling the memory of burning leaves. I tried to get my husband to come to smell it too, but he said he would later. He came in later and put his head out the door to see if he could smell it and he couldn't. I stuck my head outside of the door, and the light scent of burning leaves was gone, replaced by the slightly moldy scent of St. Louis humidity hanging in the totally still pre-dawn air.

Barbara Rogers said...

I think the smoky atmosphere has dulled your photo somehow, that's the only thing that seem lacking IMHO.

Sharon said...

Those sunflowers are beautiful.