Here is a repost of a popular and interesting article. The answer is in comments. Thanks, readers!!
I need your help this morning. This year each of these bushes in front of our kitchen window has profuse blooms after Pam pruned and fertilized them early spring. I am coming up blank with identifying them.
The two bushes are over six feet tall and lose leaves each autumn (deciduous).
Here are some photographs. Can any readers identify these bushes? The common name or scientific will be much appreciated.
Thanks so much.
Copyright 2022 All Rights Reserved Michael Stephen Wills
Minmi was a small, quadrupedal, armored, herbivorous dinosaur from Australia. Its head, neck and body were covered by bony armor, very much like today’s armadillos. Although it was slow and small brained, its armor protected it from predators. Only one specimen has been found, but it included stomach contents that show it ate leaves, fruit and seeds, and that it chewed up the plants before it swallowed them. Minmi is the location in Roma, Queensland, Australia where this dinosaur was discovered.
References: text is from the park placard with minor edits.
Copyright 2022 Michael Stephen Wills All Rights Reserved
Admittedly, I over-planned the Ireland trip. For every day possible the venues were pre-booked and paid. In theory planning provides more flexibility when life interrupts.
For the Inishmore planning, a perfect day, for me, was tooling around on a bicycle stopping where we pleased with welcome exercise in between. That was unrealistic, the day worked out otherwise.
Upon disembarking from Queen of Aran, our ferry out of Doolin, onto the Kilronan quay we walked toward the bicycle rental and Pam refused to bicycle. Her objections were many, safety, impending rain, time. She did have a point about time, the ferry leaves at a set time leaving errant tourists to fend for themselves. We were unused to cycling, still Dun Aonghasa is just over 5 miles from Kilronan, less than an hour round trip. With our starting time of 11:30 am there was 3.5 hours slack for returning to the quay before the 4 pm departure. Plenty of time for wandering the ruins and stopping along the way.
We followed Pam’s advice. Still there were the many bicyclists. Perched on our horse drawn carriage, on the uphill runs, each bicyclist we passed was proof positive to Pam of the wisdom of our choice. I was silently envious of their freedom and overlooked the many mini-buses on the narrow road.
When the day comes to mind, not often, I am left with the guilty feeling of not stopping into the bicycle rental office to cancel the reservation. An email was waiting for me the next day, asking where we were. Thus, the title of this post, “Stiffed.”
Pam’s Response to this post.
Pam’s reasons for not wanting to ride a bicycle around Inishmore: “I hadn’t been on a bike for approximately 20 years. However, if it wasn’t going to rain (it did), if the narrow road was larger, if there weren’t any minibuses loaded to the gills or horse traps sharing the same single lane, I would have considered it. Sitting back and enjoying the beautiful view on our private horse trap and listening to our very knowledgeable tour guide/driver was the highlight of this adventure for me. I am sorry you felt like you didn’t have a choice.”
Pam’s correction of my statement about her being concerned about time: “Time wasn’t a factor in my decision making. I also didn’t have a problem with you biking but there was no way I was going to do that.”
Copyright 2022 Michael Stephen Wills All Rights Reserved
Baellynasaura was a small, bipedal, herbivorous dinosaur from Australia. Unlike today’s reptiles, its top and bottom teeth touch when chewing, allowing it to consume plants. It had a remarkably long tail, which contained over 70 vertebrae, as much as 75% of its total bodyt length. It is believed Leaellynasaura’s large eyes were used to see during the long nights that Australia experienced. Recent studies, however, show that these specimens discovered are juveniles; hence, like puppies and kittens, their eyes are large regardless of where they are found in the world.
Enjoying travel on a horse trap, a type of carriage, on Inishmore , the largest Aran Island in Galway bay, we headed up Cottage Road from Kilronan, the main island settlement. It was from Kilronan we disembarked from the ferry, hired the driver and trap. Our destination an Iron Age fort, Dun Aengus, and sights along the way.
Dry Stone walls abound throughout Ireland. Ancient walls, buried in peat, were discovered in County Mayo and dated to 3,800 BC. This is a field wall on Cottage Road with daisies growing at the wall base.
The wall is composed of stones, not rocks. I have read in places a stone is a rock put to use or shaped by human hands. Other usages have rock and stone used interchangeably. For example, an internet search on “Dry Rock Wall” will return hits on the same. “You pays your money and takes your choice.”
Sources for this post: search Wikipedia for “Dry Stone”.
Tyrannosaurus Rex, the most famous of all dinosaurs, was among the largest carnivorous animals ever to walk the planet. Tyrannosaurus Rex had enormous skulls lined with up to sixty, seven-inch long teeth and could generate bite forces as great as 8,000 pounds. This allowed them to easily bite through both flesh and bone. They fed upon duck-billed dinosaurs, horned dinosaurs and even one another. Finds of multiple dinosaur fossils in the same location suggest they formed herds. A recent study showed that they lived to just thirty years of age.
Thank goodness humans never shared the environment with “The Rex.”
pure terror
References: text is from the park placard with minor edits.
Copyright 2022 Michael Stephen Wills All Rights Reserved
An access road, now blocked with huge boulders by the State Park, leads to this dam at the head of Fillmore Glen. I stop here for reflection at times and have climbed behind the dam for photographs. It is possible to drive up the south side of the glen on a poorly maintained road and park next to the boulders. In this season (spring) the surrounding forest is carpeted in wildflowers. Hepatica, trillium, dutchman’s breeches. One day, years ago, I pulled in behind a late model convertible with a license plate holder advising the owner was a member of the 10th Mountain division and a World War II veteran.
They were a well dressed and groomed couple. The white haired driver, in his late 80’s at least, patiently waited while she, a frail woman, walked the margins of the forest, enjoying the wildflowers. It was my impression this was a ritual for them, developed over the years. One of the few spring outings left to them.
Wildflower displays develop over hundreds of years. The massed trillium are on land not disturbed for thousands of years, since the last ice age. These same spring wonders were certainly enjoyed by the Iroquois before us.
Click either photograph for a larger view.
On the gorge slope below the parking area, in a hollow on the north side of a large (I recall) oak, one early sunny spring morning I discovered the last resting place of a deer. Only the bones and some fur remained, the visible portion resembles the Capitulum and trochlea of a human arm bone and, indeed, there was a scapula close by. The season is evoked by the unfurling fern against the based of the oak.
Dark, Unwritten Forest Secrets
Copyright 2022 All Rights Reserved Michael Stephen Wills
Neovenator was a very large, predatory dinosaur. Each hand and foot had three very sharp claws. Its teeth were thin, blade-like, and serrated like steak knives for cutting flesh. Short, horn-like projections above its eyes helped to recognize others of the same species. First discovered in 1978 on the Isla of Wight, United Kingdom. The fist and best-known specimen (70% complete) bears numerous injuries showing that these animals had rough and tumble lives. Perhaps such injuries were from trying to catch Iguanodons and other dinosaurs. Neovenator is derived from the latin words for “now” and “hunter.”
Skin TextureShort, horn-like projections above its eyes helped to recognize others of the same species.
Long extended tail provided balance
A creepy customer
References: text is from the park placard with minor edits.
Copyright 2022 Michael Stephen Wills All Rights Reserved
The approach to Killeany Bay of the Aran Island Inishmore is very dangerous, guarded by a Lighthouse on Straw Island to the South and the Killeany buoy to the North.
This view is to the north, northwest from a ferry en route to Inishmaan through Galway Bay. In the distance is the Connemara and the 12 Bens (12 Pins) mountains. Aran Islands, County Galway, Ireland.
There of stories of this buoy coming unmoored. October 27th 2012 it went adrift. An Aran fisherman, Micheál Seóighe (Ml Joyce) and his boat Naomh Beanán tracked it down, hauled it back to the harbor. The buoy was back in service shortly after.
Here is a photograph of me with the camera used. It is a Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III with a Canon lens 200 mm f2.8/L. I am standing on the deck of the Queen of Aran ferry out of Doolin next to the Cliffs of Mohr.
Pam Wills took this photograph with her Samsung Galaxy 4 smart phone.
One of the earliest dinosaurs, Herrerosaurus was a bipedal predator with a long and stiffened tail, three main fingers, two vestigial fingers, and sharp, serrated teeth. Its flexible lower jaw helped to grasp prey. Its long legs and hollow bones suggest it was a fast runner. Bite marks on skulls of these animals show they often battled one another, presumably over food or mates. The earliest forms were small, about 10-feet long; later ones were up to twice that length. This rare dinosaur was discovered in 1991 in the Ischigualasto Formation of Argentina.
This sculpture has a nictitating membrane, a transparent or translucent third eyelid present in some animals that can be drawn across the eye for protection and to moisten it while maintaining vision. The animatronic sculpture includes the nictating membrane lowering over eye, moving jaws and body and a roar.
Michael Stephen Wills Photography 