pencil and leaf

A Start with the Bee Plants & Bombus lapidarius sketch

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 18:27:00 +0000

I have spent many, many hours over the past month reading books, seed catalogues and online advice about how to plan the garden, what to plant, where and why. The planning has involved a lot of staring at the mud patch, a huge amount of digging and moving barrow loads of soil from A to B and then on to C and sometimes back to A again. We have added a couple of new paths, constructed two simple raised beds, (hopefully correctly placed and orientated) and excavated a small hole, now plastic lined and water filled which will, without doubt, become a magnificent wildlife pond.

Some fascinating pond progress:

It’s a small thing, but wonderful because a patch of shimmering sky has suddenly appeared in the lawn and, when the light is right, is bounced up into the kitchen to dance high on the tops of the cabinets and ripple on the ceiling..Quite lovely.

Planting the pond

This is not my first pond but the first I have tried to create with regard to native plants and wildlife. Luckily I found the extremely helpful Puddleplants who can provide wildlife friendly collections for native and ornamental ponds. So the pond is now started and after some excellent advice from Annette at Puddle, the first plants to go in are:

Deep water plant: Fringe Lily,
Oxygenator: Starwort
Marginals: Marsh marigold, Purple loosestrife, Yellow flag, Water mint, Forget me not, Bog bean, Brooklime, Cotton grass, Carex and Penny Royal.

I will add more as they become available, but (and this is doomed to fail) will try not to plant too much. It’s a problem because I tend to get over-excited about the possibilities and over-optimistic about the greenness of my fingers.
I am beginning to edge the pond with stones, have made two escape slopes for hedgehogs and small mammals, have an overhang to create a shade area and some old roof tiles and bits of wood waiting to be placed around the edge which will give cover for frogs etc.
I won’t be having any fish. Advice indicates they are not compatible with other wildlife, although I did like to see the brilliant orange flashes of my small goldfish in the previous pond who, for years, seemed to share their home companionably with frogs, newts and sticklebacks.

And more working bee drawings…

Working on the the garden, revising the rats nest of electrics in the roof and trying to get some heart into the ugly bungalow by opening up the chimney for a woodburner, seem to have caused a huge and disproportionate amount of mess and chaos. Everything has been covered in plaster dust and mud and my work room has been piled up with “stuff” so artwork has had to take a back seat for a couple of weeks. But I am back to the working sketches now and to Bombus lapidarius, the Red Tailed or Stone, Bumble Bee.

I never get tired of watching this bee. Luckily for us they are very common. The queens are big and extremely beautiful, so very velvet black and so very flame red. They were the stars of my bee walks at Heligan. Every day for two weeks, at 2.00 pm, perfectly on cue, the workers zoomed in and out of their nest. We would walk over to a patch of rather unpromising ground by a tree where there was a small hole in the earth. “Just watch” was all I had to say. The Oohhs, Ahhhs and delighted smiles were very rewarding.

They like to nest on the ground, under things, often at the base of walls or under sheds (yes…I am hopeful).. hence the name the Stone Bumble Bee. I have been looking out on BWARS for early sightings, one was possibly seen on Christmas Day but nothing reported since then. Looking at the forecast for this week I hope they are still hunkered down.
I am still undecided about the flower. The possibilities are many because they forage from a wide range of plants. Thoughts are maybe a scabious of some kind.

PS. Most fun and satisfying recent gardening activity: buying a cheap garden shredder to chop up the massive pile of mixed hedge loppings and then using them for mulch… How green are we?? …3 hrs of legal and productive destruction…highly recommended :)

From One Shed to Another

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 22:33:00 +0000

We are still slowly clearing Dads house and the difficult decision has to be made… to sell or to rent.. we are procrastinating. Practicalities of life mean that neither my sister nor I can live there at the moment but we are both reluctant to part with this lovely house and all its memories. For me, it’s the garden I love so much, particularly the trees, old nameless varieties of apples, the fig tree, the huge and ancient box tree, the magnificent copper beech, the oak planted from an acorn by Dad, the weeping ash and the massive sycamore which stands by the gate. Most were there long before us and hopefully will be there long after us….

In the mid 196Os, when we first moved, to have a fig tree seemed impossibly romantic and exotic. Some years the figs even survived the full two years and ripened. The tree is still doing well, hard pruned every year, its ancient limbs supported by equally ancient branches from other, long gone, trees. It sits in a sunny sheltered spot by an old stone wall and is the guardian of the potting shed.

The dilapidated and now tottering potting shed is one of my favourite places and according to Dad has a venerable history. It seems that in a former and more significant life it was part of the cricket ground buildings at RAF Cranwell. Now I know for a fact that Douglas Bader played cricket at Cranwell and so maybe, just maybe he once graced its humble portals. I don’t know when it gave up its raffish life and was decommissioned into quiet village retirement because it always seemed old. Dad solicitously patched, painted and propped it up over the years but now water is seeping in. Ivy has twisted its way through the sagging roof and the internal wall is collapsing. Its glazed frontage is bowed and the long neglected contents wreathed in cobwebs and muffled with dust.

The shed was operations HQ for the garden and full of the stuff you would expect to find in the sheds of thrifty gardeners. Everything was saved recycled and reused. There is an WWII jerry can with petrol for the mower, along with the metal funnel wrapped in a stocking for filtering. There are old, unraveling, wicker baskets full of knotted garden twine, bundles of netting, wire, a bag of fertiliser bags, pots broken and whole, bits of wood, tiles, buckets full of soil improvers, many plant tags, a bunch of old keys, old galvanised watering cans hang from the ceiling, an ancient metal pump sprayer, tools, sharpening stones, oil cans, scythes, hoes, rakes, spades, forks etc etc, other unidentifiable bits of iron and Dads old army kit-bag now green and mouldy but seemingly intact and, most enchantingly to me, the wooden clockcase where once a robin made its nest and of course a horseshoe over the door.

Then there is my shed here at the ugly bungalow, now finally finished, equally lovingly patched and painted but, like the bungalow, characterless and empty.

My shed, first sighting in September, pre buying.. I thought it had potential!

Shed Jan 2012, now finished after many coats of paint and a new roof and some general TLC.

So, for nostalgic reasons, along with a large dollop of that inherited Yorkshire thrift I am moving some things from Dads shed to mine. The old basket of twine, some pots, some tools etc. They are not sitting too well at the moment in the pristine newly painted interior, but I guess a year will mellow things and it gives me enormous pleasure to do the light digging with my Mothers “ladies” garden fork, trim the hedge with Dads much sharpened shears and plant up the old pots with new life.
I have brought the clock case, hoping that maybe a bumblebee will take a liking to it and of course I have the spare old horseshoe .. still to be nailed above the door, which once adorned the dainty hoof of my beloved dapple grey mare and will remind me of clip clopping round the Lincolnshire country lanes.

Sentimental? Moi???…. :) I guess old age is just taking its toll…

Wonderful things, sheds…and for those of you who also love your sheds, you can show and share your passion on Readersheds.co.uk. The Potting Shed will be up there soon!

Mahonia and B terrestris

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 17:45:00 +0000

The very first shrub I have planted in my new garden is a little Mahonia. I grew one in my garden in Deal, where it gallantly survived the shade of a row of leylandii, hardly ever saw any sun but still grew tall and handsome, brightening up a very dark corner every winter. Here it will cheer up an equally gloomy spot and once it gets going will provide sustenance for a variety of insects. Even though it is tiny, it is already providing a brilliant flash of yellow which I can see from the kitchen window when I am washing up.

I went up to Dad’s garden on Thursday where there is a magnificent untrimmed specimen of, I guess, about 12 feet. It grows under the huge copper beech while another smaller one lives on the shady half moon bed. Reading more about Mahonias it seems the genus was named by Thomas Nuttall in 1818 in honour of Bernard McMahon, 1775-1816 famous for his first seed catalogue of USA plants. The great Lewis and Clark Expedition which collected specimens of the mahonias was planned from his home but it seems a shame he was remembered after his death!

Since I started looking out for bees, mahonias have proved to be very rewarding Early insects and bees just love them! Looking through my photos from last year I see bumble bees, B lapidarius, B hortorum, honey bees and of course B terrestris queens which is why I am teaming them up for this painting.

B lapidarius and Mahonia, March 2011

My first thumbnail rough which I flipped.

Bombus terrestris and Mahonia, second rough.

I brought a flower spike (correctly called a raceme) back from Dad’s house to sketch. His big Mahonia could spare one. I have never really looked closely at a spray of the florets before. It is quite complex, opening out from tight greeny yellow buds through neat little cadmium yellow flowers to overblown brownish papery remnants, then leaving a fringe of little bright green seed heads some turning black and shriveled. Hmm it is complex!

Getting to know Mahonia …….

Bombus pratorum and the Hairiness of Bees

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 10:33:00 +0000

For this six bee commission I have decided to paint the male of this species. I saw so many of them last year and they are simply enchanting. They were zipping around the tiny flowers of the cotoneaster in the churchyard here. They are easy to spot because of their bright lemony yellow colour and orangy tail, yellow moustache and long silky hair. They are extremely pretty.

The Hairiness of Bees

Bumble bees differ quite considerably in the quality of their hair. B hortorum for example, has quite long scruffy hair whereas B lapidarius has closer short dense hair more like velvet. The hair may differ between male and female. The term used for bumble bee hair is “pile” (which always makes me think of carpet). The hairs are referred to as “setae” and have a particular quality. Here is the explanation from the excellent BumbleBee.org which is packed with expert info.

“The other adaptation of the hair is that many are branched or feathery enabling more pollen to stick to them, as can be seen in the scanning electron microscope images (SEM) right, and below.

“When flying a bee builds up an electrostatic charge, the parts of a flower are usually well earthed, the stigma (the bit that leads to the ovary) more so than other flower parts, so as the bee enters the flower the pollen is attracted to the bee's hairs and even grains of pollen that are not touched by the hairs can jump a few millimetres to the nearest hair. When a pollen covered bee enters a flower, because the stigma is better earthed than the other parts of the flower the charged pollen is preferentially attracted to it. So even if the large, hairy, bumblebee fails to brush against the stigma, the pollen can jump the few millimetres necessary for pollination.”

Text and images from Bumblebee.org

Below another Scanning Electron Microscope photo of the hairs of US species B fraternus from Duke University.

A photo submitted to Springwatch in 2010 demonstrates the attraction of pollen to bees!

“Little bee © Mark Johnson from the 2010 Springwatch Flickr group!

Bombus Pratorum and Cotoneaster

The cotoneaster, where I watched the bees last May, has almost overtaken a particularly nice old grave in a part of the churchyard where wildflower spotting signs are displayed in the summer. I am assuming it’s a Cotoneaster horizontalis, one I particularly like with its spreading, low growing habit, the tiny dainty flowers and leaves contrasting with the lichen covered gnarly branches. There are a couple of small ones in the garden here. I hope there will be bees!

A little B pratorum male.

Working out the pose and composition.

Mr Fluffy :)….

Painting the hair slightly ruffled hair will be a challenge.

Larks & Robins, and other early Birds

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 13:03:00 +0000

I am, without a shadow of a doubt a lark. I am awake and chirpy at dawn or much earlier. At the beginning of January I was up early, about 4.00 and looking out of the kitchen window saw what I thought was a shooting star zipping across sky. (I now know this was part of the Quadrantid meteor shower).. It was a wonderful sight and I opened the door to see if there were any more. No more shooting stars but there was some very loud singing from the nearby tall hedge.

Loud Night Singing

Since then I have been much more aware of a night singing bird (or birds), and it seems to be robins. Which does make sense because there are many robins here. Two patrol the garden every day (which I now presume are a pair, see below) and are the first to the scraps and seeds we put out in the morning. I don’t know much about birds really so, to me, this was very interesting.

From Ask an Expert on the RSPB site

Robins are one of the few birds that hold a territory throughout the winter so continue to sing when the majority of other birds have stopped.

Robins are often one of the first birds to start singing in the morning and the last to finish in the evening so are used to being active in low light conditions. In places where there are street lamps or other artificial light sources, robins can be triggered to start singing because it does not get completely dark. Other disturbances, like a loud noise or movement, can also start birds singing in the night.
Katherine Stevenson RSPB.

and from the delightful site Garden Birds.co.uk

….they can usually be heard singing their melodious warbling song from strategic perches, often quite high up; it sounds like "twiddle-oo, twiddle-eedee, twiddle-oo twiddle". In the winter, it can sound wistful, some say mournful, but around Christmastime the song becomes stronger and more passionate.

Robins, both males and females, hold their own separate feeding territories in the winter, which they defend vigorously. By around Christmas, many will have paired up. Initially, they do not spend much time together, merely tolerate one another, but will remain together until the following autumn moult.

I also learnt this, something I had never really noticed!

“Robins are rarely seen or heard during midsummer (July-August) when they are moulting and become rather retiring.”

I read that some people find the nocturnal serenade annoying… but I think it is very beautiful. There is a black bird singing outside as I type. Even through the closed window I can hear it. It’s quite lovely.

In the morning now it is getting light at about 7.30 and there are a couple of blackbirds and robins waiting hopefully by the hedge. We watch them along with a variety of other birds who come to the feeders. We are seeing more and more now and they seem to arrive at different times of the day. The blackbirds and robins are the first, the little longtailed tits visit in gangs later in the day as do the starlings.

Bird list yesterday: Chaffinches, Robins, Great tits, Longtailed tits, lots of Blackbirds who all squabble, a Wren, a beautiful pair of Wagtails who come every day, 2 Ringdoves, Sparrows, Blue tits, Starlings, a Magpie.

I made a quick sketch on a torn out bit of paper this morning in between bee drawing. The robin was sitting a stick outside my window. I intend to get to grips with painting birds later this year.

Go to Brett Westwoods page on the BBC where you can hear its pretty song with lots of others and don’t forget the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch. Watch for one hour on 28 or 29 January 2012 and send in your sightings!

Do Bees Have Characters?

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 15:50:00 +0000

It is something I often wonder when I am painting them. I am not particularly fanciful or overly sentimental but I do like to express something of what I think might be a bee’s character. “Characteristic” is probably a more acceptable term for the naturalist or scientist. There certainly do seem to be differences between species and within species.. we describe different honey bee strains as “docile” or “aggressive”. But that’s not really character. Do bees get depressed or elated, is one Queen more attentive to her brood than another, one worker a harder worker than another? I don’t know.

I had been reading Sladen’s wonderful “The Humble Bee” again to remind myself of his observations, which were both affectionate and important. I think he would have voted for character. He raised broods of bees in his garden and study so that he could watch and record them. Here he has found a searching lapidarius queen to take over small orphaned colony.

“I first introduced the queen to the brood. While she was yet an inch away from it she suddenly abandoned her ordinary dull and careless manner and , standing at attention , stretched out her antennae…. Then she advanced cautiously, and when half a minute later she reached the brood she showed great satisfaction and immediately stretched herself over it.”

On another occasion he has taken a queen out of her nest to eradicate some pesky ants. When he puts her back he notes.

“She was very pleased to get back to her brood. When I came to fill the honey pot I found the lump of comb had rolled almost off the sacking, so I hollowed the latter in the middle to retain it. The queen seemed to consider the brood to be insufficiently covered and ran about pulling and detaching bits of nest material with her jaws and carding them with her legs. She even tried to bite little pieces off the edges of the sacking. While thus occupied she frequently returned to the brood and always when she reached it emitted little buzzes of pleasure.”

from FW Sladen’s The Humble Bee 1912.

Sketches

I have been doing some more sketching to get me back into the shape of bumble bees. They pose problems because I like to try to show some part of the eye. Again it’s a human response ..we seek out eyes to engage with, even if they are not “eyes” in our sense. But their hunched shape means that in quite a few views the head is hidden.

For the B terrestris and honeysuckle I was wondering if I should tilt the view to look up, more of a worm eye view. But with this bee it’s important to show the long head, the tongue and the characteristic two yellow stripes on the thorax

Eventually I decide on a side view.

So this Bombus hortorum will be “reaching up” with its front legs, approaching a honeysuckle flower.

To be less anthropomorphic perhaps I should just say “raising its front legs” because “reaching up” can signify a very human, emotionally charged, action. It can be a request for help or for an embrace, an attempt to grasp something just out of reach, or to hold onto something to prevent a fall, or an appeal to be lifted up.

I have watched bees, especially bumble bees, reaching up to grasp the edges of petals. Sometimes you feel you want to give them a helping hand and very often if you gently offer a finger for them to rest their back legs on they will willingly accept. This is very non-scientific language I know, but it’s very endearing behaviour.

…and as my aim is to win the affection of kind hearted people and recruit them to the bee cause then my Bombus hortorum, here, will definitely be “reaching up”.

Garden (and others’) Note Book(s)

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 08:30:00 +0000

With this new garden I have decided to try to be systematic. I somehow know it will not last but it’s worth a try. So I have started to keep a list of the plants already in the garden and the plants/seeds I buy. I would like to think I will carefully note their position, their progress, what I feed them with, cropping yields, (there’s optimism for you).. and of course bee attractivness etc

So I looked around for a notebook. I think I’ve mentioned before my aversion to new note books or sketchbooks and so the part-used old notebook tucked into the seed box at Dad’s house seemed both apt and appealing. It’s a small 6 x 3 3/4 inch blue hardback with a grey cloth spine. One of those anonymous note books without a makers name which you used to find in the old fashioned stationers. A great size to put in your pocket.

At the front there are a few pages of notes from a holiday in Madeira. Mum has noted the children running home from school, Dad has made lists of costs. At the back are notes detailing “Good Local Walks”, plant lists and plans for the garden i.e., “move white potentilla to west fence, eliminate wild onion weeds” (sorry Mum, I know they are still there). The earliest entry is 1987 and notes have been made by both Mum and Dad.

Mum and Dad’s notes: A list of plants and a page entitled “Spring 1998, after a long (cold) dry winter” with an enigmatic small end board sketch of something measuring 8 x17 x10 inches.

My first notes in the book with sketches of the garden.

As I was entering my first list, “Plants I Have”, I was also listening to the radio, to the fascinating BBC’s History of the Written World. Melvyn Bragg was discussing how important writing was and possibly still is, to science. “how the invention of writing made the scientific revolution of the Enlightenment possible “ and how the note books of scientists were key in the processing, recording and passing on of information and ideas. They were discussing Newton’s 1665 notes made in his twenties, of an experiment on his own eye which involved pushing a bodkin in between the eyeball and the bone and changing the shape of the eye. On the BBC website there is Newton’s page …how wonderful. Isn’t the potency of the handwritten note and drawing extraordinary? Even looking at this image on a computer screen sends a shiver up my spine. Prof Simon Schaffer describes the note books as “paper laboratories” a marvellous description.

The text reads "I took a bodkin and put it between my eye and the bone as near to the backside of my eye as I could: & pressing my eye with the end of it there appeared several white, dark and coloured circles.” You can listen to all of “The Written World” episodes on BBC Iplayer.

I can’t, unfortunately, make a comparison between the content of these notebooks, I can only find a comforting similarity in practice. Newton used both ends of his notebooks.. as did my parents. My own inconsistency is so great that I use note books randomly, middle, end, upside down and sideways.. but there is very seldom anything on the first page. I shudder to think what that might signify.

The University of Cambridge is making Newton’s Papers available online see here for a wonderful, absorbing and humbling look at the work of an exceptional man.

There is, delightfully, a wealth of other inspirational notebooks on line. Here is Darwin’s famous “tree” from his Notebook B.

This note and sketch “depicts the branching system of descent with modification which he realized could explain the relationship between different species in the same class or family.” from Darwin Online.

And one of Leonardo’s notebook pages from the British Libraries, Turning The Pages site where you can view manuscripts and note books from composers writers and artists etc.

This page is from around 1508 “This double page forms a single sheet containing notes and diagrams relating to balances and weights, with a sketch of a cockleshell in the margin” Hmm…nice sketch.

I embrace the internet and computers for all the wonderful things they have made possible, especially enabling me to access these fabulous documents from my desk….but I hope people still continue to jot down their lists and thoughts in notebooks in their own hand and not on the impersonal keyboard. A world without hand written notes would be an anodyne and soulless place.

Garden Ghosts and An Interesting Plant

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 15:14:00 +0000

Taking over a garden is a curious business, initially you feel an intruder and hesitant to make changes. In my case it is definitely an uneasy new relationship, where circumstances have thrown both parties together, not necessarily by choice.
For my part I have to persuade this neglected garden that my intentions are both honourable and benign.
For its part, I am hoping for some cooperation and surprises. I am very aware that this garden has its own character, its own strengths and weaknesses and that hopefully we can combine our talents to create something lovely. There will be things to negotiate, some ground rules to establish and both compromises and discoveries to be made.

Ghosts and Discoveries

Currently I’m in the discovery phase. Although superficially there is not much in this garden, as I explore a little more, a distant history of love and care is becoming more evident. I have found the old remains of a compost heap, its archeological layers revealing a thoughtful past. Digging has unearthed faded plant labels, and a few pale name sticks belonging to the ghosts of plants long gone plants: rue, carrots, santolina, and snow in summer. There are piles of rocks, and pebbles which are from somewhere else, the leg of a plaster dog, a small concrete toadstool, 2 shiny spiral shells, and some odd pieces of Lego still glowing brilliantly in the earth.

Someone tried to improve this heavy soil with bags of sand, I found one buried behind the shed. Wooden edging was carefully laid and a swelling curve was made in one of the borders just to relieve the straight lines. By the hardstanding is a boat tethering hook. I find all this a quite fascinating and quite touching.

The Cat Flap

But, most poignantly of all, clearing the undergrowth from around the shed revealed a, now rusted, cat flap. I wonder who it was, which Tiddles, Fluffy or High Priestess-Slayer-of-Mice snoozed away their sundrenched afternoons in there. How many saucers of milk, how many fond strokings and caresses were administered and how many little animal offerings were laid in return at the kitchen door.
I think I will restore it to full working order… just as I will take a strip out of the wooden perimeter fence to allow small creatures both access and escape. Who knows what little animal might need a refuge.

Tiny sketchbook note.. pre shed-painting.

An Interesting (American) Plant

As I go I am trying to identify the plants which already grow in the garden. At this time of year you have to take care, you really don’t know who or what is sleeping or where. Already in the desolate wasteland of the front mud patch there are a few bluebells struggling up through the gravel and some daffodil leaves are emerging by the fence… hope!

And over by the fence there is a tall leggy shrub which still has a few leaves. Over the last few weeks I have driven myself mad trying to identify it. Then I stumbled upon it by accident ..it is a Fremontodendron and a completely new plant to me.

These are the leaves, a small mallow shape but with a very rough pale underside, rather like sandpaper.

and this is how it will flower…hopefully…

Fremontodenron ….the Flannel Bush

Photo Flannel bush 'California Glory' from the RHS website.

Family Malvaceae

This showy shrub is originally from the Southwest USA and Northwest Mexico, but does appear to be a good UK shrub, for a sunny wall particularly. Mine does not have a wall to snuggle up to, only a low fence and a bit of hedge and I would not say it is particularly happy… I am watching the poor thing being lashed by the rain and wind as I write, but it is a rather nice discovery and I am looking forward to those bright happy flowers. Should we be feeling the lack of Florida sun (yes, we are) this will help cheer us up.

In fact if we are missing the USA there have been some odd comforting reminders here. We bought the ugly bungalow from a (non gardening) American lady who left a few cleaning products, so when I opened the cupboards there were my old USA friends; Clorox, swiffers, some unidentifiable soaps and bleaching products, all with USA labels, she will have bought them from the local USA air base shop. And now this USA tree… which I am certain she did not plant. She will, I think, have been totally unaware of the presence of her compatriot over by the hedge.

Not only is this handsome plant from America, it is also named after an all American hero, one “John Charles Frémont (January 21, 1813 – July 13, 1890), an American military officer, explorer, and the first candidate of the anti-slavery Republican Party for the office of President of the United States”

There is a fascinating and very enthusiastic website about him http://www.longcamp.com/ which has many accounts of his exploits.

“His enterprises are full of hardship and peril,
and the wildest romance.
To sleep under the open heaven,
and depend on one's rifle for food,
is coming about as near the primitive state of the hunter
as a civilized man may well get;
and yet this life, in this case,
is adorned with the triumphs of science.”
…Walter Colton

It seems he was a complex man, but amongst other things was an extraordinary explorer and botanical collector.

“In the course of his five explorations of the West, Frémont collected over 1,400 botanical specimens, many new to the taxonomy--163 new species or varieties, 19 new genera.”
Below is a surviving specimen sheet of Scutellaria antirrhinoides var. californica, Scullcap, collected on one of his hair raising trips to the West. One where many of his horses and his collected plants were lost.

Image and info again from the Longcamp site, see botany.

Fremontodendron Leaf

A small sketch of the leaf…which was beginning to curl by the time I got round to drawing it.

I am glad to have this plant growing opposite my studio window. I will be reminded of sunshine and friends, both animal and vegetable, back in the USA and of those extraordinary explorers of the 19th century who I find so fascinating and so inspirational.

New “Big Six”: First Roughs

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 17:01:00 +0000

It’s back to work now and I have started the new “Big Six Bumble Bees” commission and have moved on from scribbled notes to thumbnail roughs. This is where I sort out what I am doing and why, and where I check that they will work, not only as individual paintings, but as a set. I think they will be hung in a line rather than in a block and I know they will all be framed the same.

So my initial considerations are these:

Which bee with which flower
A variety of poses
A variety of flower shapes
A variety of designs… i.e. left to right, central, bottom or top heavy.

The paintings are for a bee enthusiast who has a very beautiful old house in Lincolnshire, the flowers need to reflect the garden and of course be compatible with the bee. ie tongue length etc.

Scruffy notes….

First Designs

Things may well change but for now the Bee/Plant combinations are these:

Bombus pratorum:. The Early Bumble Bee with Cotoneaster. This is a small bee with a short tongue. I saw many of them at Grafham last year on Cotoneaster in the churchyard… and it’s a little compact flower with an arching design to the branch.

Bombus terrestris: The Buff tailed Bumble Bee with Mahonia. Mahonia is, year after year one of the very best winter plants for early bumblebees. I have just planted one here and saw terrestris queens on Dad’s Mahonia last year.

Bombus hortorum: The Garden Bumble Bee with Honeysuckle. The long tongued bumble bee who can access the nectar from the long tubular flowers of honeysuckles. It’s again such a favourite country garden flower.

Bombus lapidarius: The Red Tailed Bumble Bee on cosmos/daisy type flower. I love to see bees running around the top of flowers.. it may change into a thistle, but I wanted one central flower head for the set.

Bombus pascuorum: The Common Carder Bee with a foxglove. I saw so many of both at Heligan. A different shaped flower as well.

Bombus lucorum: The White tailed Bumble Bee on lavender. I had to include lavender, not only is it a true favourite with all bees but it is also a later flower.

Reassessing

When I added a bit of colour I realised all the yellow and black bees were facing the same way and both of the redtailed bees were facing the same way. This wont do…

So I flipped the terrestris /mahonia, which looks fine, and then the lapidarius, which doesn’t alter the design at all. That’s better. It’s just a small thing but keeps the variety of pose, direction, and design that I want.

That’s all for today!….

Double Happiness for an Auspicious New Year

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 17:43:00 +0000

Here it is, a New Year, and an already auspicious 2012.

Here we are, starting a new year in the UK, the first time for 8 years.

Here before me is my new garden for which there is hope, behind me the ugly bungalow for which there is perhaps less hope.

And here, in my head, are lists of resolutions longer than the tap roots of a happy dandelion…….. Ahhh, the lure of a list of good intentions.

But why auspicious? Well, first thing this morning two magpies were dancing on the lawn, what luck! …and secondly, for some reason I happened to look at the Chinese calendar for this coming year, and to my delight it will be the Year of the Dragon… my Year!

Bathing in the sweet expectations of glorious things to come I am standing by the kitchen door surveying garden progress. I had hoped to have finished the shed by today and although it’s not quite there yet, the small pond is half dug and the muddy wasteland of the front lawn has the foundations of a new path. There is a little collection of shrubs in pots waiting to be planted and the leylandii are cowering by the east fence. They know their days are numbered.

Today, for me, is a day to contemplate the coming year.. to mull over the resolutions, to sharpen the green pencils, clean all the brushes and continue painting the shed.

I hope that for you, today is also one of hopes and dreams.

And here to wish you double happiness are two Chinese magpies by Northern Song Dynasty artist Cui Bo from an ancient and most beautiful scroll.

“Double Happiness”

This painting has the title "Double Happiness," a reference to the pronunciation of the Chinese word for magpie. "Two magpies" was pronounced the same as "two happinesses," so a painting of two magpies was a pictorial metaphor for double happiness and thus an appropriate subject for a painting to be given to someone to express congratulations

The painting is signed and dated 1061, making it the earliest such signed and dated painting and is kept in the National Palace Museum, Taipei.

from: A Visual Sourcebook of Chinese Civilization, prepared by Patricia Buckley Ebrey. Washington University.

A Very Happy, Fulfilled and Joyful New Year to you All!

A Very Merry Christmas to you All.

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 15:27:00 +0000

At last, the year is on the turn and I am feeling optimistic about 2012.
I am hoping for a mild Christmas so that I can continue painting the shed, but if it’s cold and wet I shall be inside reading my Christmas book “Creating a Forest Garden” by Martin Crawford. True, it is slightly ambitious for my mud patch but I am optimistic about that too.

I have just finished Marty’s honey bee for her site Beezations, Her bees, she tells me, are shivering upstate! I sympathise. Marty, I wish you and the girls well for 2012.

And so, bee friends, bee converts and even those still not quite sure; while you are browsing the garden catalogues please add a few seeds for bees to your basket, order an early willow, some late Michelmas daisies, or plan where to put that bee house. Your reward will be an exuberant, productive and buzzing garden.. and what could be nicer.

I wish you all Season Greetings and thank you for all your support, on the blog, through your kind comments and emails, for buying prints, postcards, originals and BUZZ books. You have all helped keep me and the bees going and make the ups and downs of 2011 end on a high note.

Ideas, Sketches Plans and some 2012 Dates

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 16:36:00 +0000

I have been spending every spare minute outside, even though it’s cold, the lure of the shed and my garden is irresistible. My work room also looks out onto the garden, which in some ways is a mistake as I spend hours gazing out onto the bleak leafless scene. I, of course, am seeing something different. I am seeing the magnificent flower filled vista that it surely will become. I have started making some rough sketches, just of what I have for now. It will be interesting to see how it changes!

I am also watching the birds, hesitant at first to try a new bird table, but they are coming. Blue tits, great tits, the gorgeous long tailed tits robins, chaffinches, sparrows, blackbirds, starlings, pigeons and of course magpies. To encourage them I have put the bird feeder by the hedge giving them some perching places but it’s too far away to see very clearly. When I have more foliage in the garden I can edge them nearer to my window.
I have done some rough sketches but I need lots more observation and drawing time to understand them. But as always its better than nothing! So,some robins, delightful long tailed tits who swoop into the garden in little gangs and a couple of ring doves disconsolately sitting in the bare apple tree.. they sat there in the rain almost motionless, for nearly an hour.. nice and easy to sketch!

On the Bee Front

I have been busy sending out print and book orders and have a commission for a new set of the Big Six Bumble bees and two more individual bees. This is wonderful because it gives me a chance to try some new plant/bee relationships and do some more research. So far I am just at the very scribbly thumbnail stage.

Marty’s Bee, Marty eventually decided to go with the first rough of the Honey bee and Goldenrod. So one more rough for her approval and then on with the painting.

More projects: Ceramics and the Bee Book.

In between the ups and downs of this year there has been lots going on behind the blog.. I once referred to the blog as the outwardly serene swan of my life whereas in reality I am paddling madly in the background, trying to keep things going! Sometimes I look at my heaped desk and wonder if I will ever get straight.

I have been developing a range of BUZZ ceramics with a small UK company which we will be launching ( hopefully) at the International Gift Fair in Feb and also working with Marc of the excellent Foxleas website to try to get our Bee Book knocked into shape. We both feel there is a need and a gap in the market so are putting together the first manuscript and design. Lots of work!

Two exhibitions, and my Bugs Beasts and Botanicals Workshops

I have two fantastic return visits planned next year.

Nature in Art

I will be Artist in Residence again at the wonderful Nature on Art in Gloucestershire and this time I am also running a two day Bugs Beasts and Botanicals Workshop. The workshop is March 31st & April 1st and I am Artist in Residence for the week 2nd to 9th April, which is Easter week.

Easton Walled Gardens

And I am back to the lovely Easton Walled Gardens in June for a week long exhibition starting June 3rd with an accompanying two day Bugs Beasts and Botanicals Workshop working in the beautiful Gardens there on 7th & 8th June This will be as part of their “Meadow Celebration” event over the Bank Holiday June 3rd and 4th.

I will also be running a couple of extra Bugs, Beasts and Botanicals workshops at Easton, joining forces with the excellent Live and Learn Organisation these will be:

19th April: A short half day taster course

26th April: A full day at Easton.. fab!

Stamford Arts Centre

Also with Live and Learn at Stamford Arts Centre, Lincs to run some “Bugs Beasts and Botanicals” workshops,

25th Feb : Learn to Draw botanicals a taster 3hrs.

24th March : Bugs beasts and Botanicals a full day

I will be posting more details of the workshops and shows as I get them.

That’s all for now !

First Snow

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 16:01:00 +0000

We woke to snow. First snow may not really register with many here, especially after last year’s bitter Winter, but for us, soft, sun loving, warm climate returnees it is the first real snow we have seen for many years.

It’s strange stuff, it muffles and chokes and clogs things. It turns things into something else, transforms places into somewhere else. The white grass is quite shocking. The sky is darker than the land. Things don’t look quite right.

Starlings, crows and rooks look even an blacker black ... and I am reminded of Robert Frost’s curious poem. A favourite of mine.

DUST OF SNOW

The way a crow
Shook down on me
The dust of snow
From a hemlock tree
Has given my heart
A change of mood
And saved some part
Of a day I had rued.

Robert Frost

The other day I had taken down 3 small bird boxes that had been abandoned in every way .. left high and dry and disintegrating up on the side wall. I am going to give them some TLC and replace the perches. They are standing by the conservatory door waiting to be attended to and this morning their little roofs covered are with snow. I can see them from my work room, so made a sketch.

Then I thought this was a rather nice image, so painted it again and added a robin. I was watching the robins yesterday and had made a few sketches.

Hmm almost Christmassy!

It’s lunchtime now and all the snow has gone…

Auntie Bessie’s Aspidistra

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 18:17:00 +0000

At the weekend we went up to Dad’s house to bring back a few more bits and pieces and the last of the house plants. Recently on Gardeners Question Time, Pippa Greenwood was saying how difficult she finds it to throw away surplus seedlings. I am having the same problem with Dad’s pot plants. I had already transported the tender begonia, the money plant I resurrected from the greenhouse a couple of years ago and a nice little cactus, back to the Ugly Bungalow where it is at least a bit warmer. Three more questionable plants were left to survive until we had more room in the car. This time they looked forlorn and abandoned, so back they came. The croton I fear is on its last legs, and the ancient poinsettia, I think given to Dad 2 years ago, is straggly and woody and has lost most of its lower leaves, but the one plant which is more or less the same is the Aspidistra.

It is really mine. Given to me by my Auntie Bessie and at a rough count it has been with me for over 30 years. I left it with Dad eight years ago. “You will look after Auntie Bessie, wont you Dad?” He waved his hand. “It can go in the porch.”

In its life it has survived incredible neglect, latterly because Dad really had forgotten it even existed. It has been cut back to nothing, had its leaves ignominiously snipped and trimmed of those unsightly brown ends and those same poor leaves have been repeatedly trapped in the door because it was really too big for the porch. It’s been subjected to drowning and drought by turn, endured blistering heat and freezing cold. It lost most of its leaves last year, so on a visit home and in a final kill or cure attempt, I repotted it and sure enough on my next visit some months later a few new leaves were struggling to unfurl, imprisoned by rock hard dry soil. “For Christ’s sake will someone please water this plant!!

And so it has survived, suffering in silence in the porch. .. I think its problem is that none of us really like it. But none of us can bear to kill it… because in effect it is Auntie Bessie… and we all loved her very much.

So here it is, uncertainly left in the hall for now, where it is, again, too big. It seems to hover like the rather unwelcome guest who hasn’t taken the hint to leave. We bump into it and brush past its leaves. An appropriately ugly plant for the Ugly Bungalow. Do two ugly’s cancel each other out? No. But despite its brown tipped leathery leaves and its lopsided growth, its incredible tenacity has earned it a duty of care and a grudging affection. It is, from floor to top of the highest leaf, 3ft high.

Sketch done with chunky water-soluble pencil… nice for quick work.

I intend to lavish as much love and affection on this plant as I am doing on the shed. ( Good Shed News: … the shed has a new roof! Ahhh joy ) but I am wondering if it will survive affection, having gone so long without.

Some people call these passed-down plants, “Heirloom plants”… how nice. It conjures up a cosseted, pampered much-loved thing, carefully propagated and handed down. The Aspidistra just came to stay and never left… but I promise you Auntie Bessie, I will now look after it… sadly, that dreadful hat you knitted for me when I was ten just had to go. :)

Glorious Goldenrod

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 15:08:00 +0000

Goldenrod is a fascinating and wonderful plant. We do have a wild goldenrod here in the UK Solidago virgaurea (European goldenrod or woundwort). It’s another plant that likes scrubby wasteland areas and is sometimes mistaken for ragwort.

My USA Goldenrod moment
USA goldenrods are very beautiful, varied and … of course, can be much bigger than ours. My most memorable goldenrod moment in the USA was a visit to the wonderful Thomas Edison house in Fort Meyers. It was in his small lab here that he experimented with the possibility of extracting rubber from Goldenrod, See a recent article, “Bouncing Back to Life” from Preservation Magazine about the restoration of the lab and about his search for rubber.

Here from the Edison House Website is Edison with his own huge Goldenrod (Solidago Edisonia). He crossed a common goldenrod with a huge everglades species, Solidago gigantea.

Golden Rod: Friend of bugs

Should you have your doubts about your feelings towards goldenrods, which can be considered a weed I know, have a look at Beatriz Moisset’s wonderful set of Flickr photos called Goldenrod Zoo, here and then read her excellent article on Native Plants and Wildlife Gardens website about the many (… over 300!) species of “visitors” who love this sunshine plant.

Golden Rod: a Useful Herb

I have a favourite old set of family books, Frederick Edward Hulme’s, Familiar Wild Flowers. This is from the Golden Rod entry.

The generic name Solidago is derived from the Latin word “solidare” to unite, the name being bestowed from a belief in the vulnerary ( I had to look this up ..it means good for healing exterior wounds) virtues of the plant…The specific name was change to Virgaurea, by Matthiolus. The name is admirably descriptive and is in fact but a Latinised version of its English name , “virga” being a stem or rod while “aurea”signifies golden.

Hulme goes on to record Gerard’s interesting observations in 1633 about human nature and rarity.. It seems that Golden Rod once was a rare and much sought after healing herb…but availability apparently bred contempt… ‘twas ever thus…?

Gerard writes in his “Generall Historie of Plantes” 1633:

In my rememberance I haue knowne the dry herbe which came from beyond the sea sold in Bucklers Bury in London of halfe a crown an ounce. But since it was found in Hampstead wood …no man will giue halfe a crowne for an hundredweight of it:….Our phantasticall physitions when they have found an approued medicine and perfect remedie they wil seeke a new ( and more expensive and profitable??) and farther off, and by that meanes, many times, hurt more than they helpe.”

Hulme’ s European Golden Rod, from “Familiar Wild Flowers” Cassell 1910 (approx)

Frederick Hulme was another of those many fascinating Victorians who observed, drew, recorded and shared their passions for the natural world. More of him another time.

Goldenrod notes & sketches

Wild Goldenrod can sometimes be confused with Common Ragwort Senecio jacobaea. or I think now renamed Jacobaea vulgaris.
Generally the leaf of ragwort is different, much more deeply lobed.
However Broadleafed Ragwort, Senecio fluviatilis Wallr has a rather similar leaf.
Does this help? Hmmm…

Goldenrod and Broadleaved ragwort, preserved specimens from the fabulous resource the UK and Irish Herbaria online.
It’s a wonderful site to browse and I have been too busy reading to do much drawing but did make a prelim page of notes.

There is so much to discover about Goldenrod, especially about the insects it supports, from beautiful plume moths to bees and hoveflies and little gall wasps. All that has to be another post .

Something from the Past

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 19:12:00 +0000

There is still so much to do at my father’s house. Superficially all looks just the same and I go from time to time to do a bit more “sorting”.
When I open the door I often imagine I will hear “Hello love, marvelous to see you”, his customary greeting and when I stay overnight I rewind the Grandfather clock, because to sleep in the empty house without its comforting tick, tock and chime would be unbearable. As far back as I can remember the clock has marked our minutes, hours, days and years.
I go back to try and sort a few more things, bring a few useful and familiar items back to the ugly bungalow and I try hard to throw a few things away. I am failing badly here. It is all made more difficult because Dad made notes on everything. On things, in things, about thing and under things. Little notes, in his increasingly shaky handwriting with descriptions, optimistic valuations, dimensions and dates, turn up everywhere. I moved an old radio which was almost rooted to the kitchen shelf .. and sure enough underneath is a little note. On it is written dimensions and frequencies. It has not been looked at for years.

Then upstairs there are still the old photos. They are in 2 shoeboxes, with makeshift cardboard dividers cut from old packaging, and in old used envelopes, all roughly titled:… “Frank”, (Dads brother) “Our family”, “Other People”,” Joyce’s family”, “Holidays abroad” etc, etc. My sister and I have poured over them and put them back.
When I was last home I found a slender unmarked envelope containing just a few old holiday snaps. I had missed it before but, inside it, was this! Faded, and of course just about the only thing in the house without a note or a date or anything…it’s a little Polaroid, taken years ago. It must have been in the 1970’s.
It’s Mum and Dad.. Beekeepers! It made me smile..

I also found one of the beekeeping suits.. I am keeping it .. just in case!

Marty’s Honey Bee and a Goldenrod stem.

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 18:36:00 +0000

Marty contacted me a while ago to very kindly ask if I could paint her a honey bee to use on her website and her publicity for Beezations her “growing apiary of treatment-free hives at the edge of the Catskills in upstate New York”.

Marty’s hives are ruled by a variety of lovely Queen bees.. “Queen Camilla is a mild Italian…..Queen Marianne II is a feisty Russian with great genes from a Pennsylvania apiary….Queen Eleanor is a Carniolan mix who was bred at an apiary in Brewster, NY and Queen Kate II is the daughter of an Italian queen who was overthrown by her subjects in the spring of 2011…..” and more.

She sells shares in her hives and will reward the shareholders with gorgeous honey from their hard working bees.. A lovely idea!

I sent her a couple of thumbnail roughs which feature either a Goldenrod or a New England Aster.. and of course a bee.

The general feeling, via her blog and facebook votes was; the curve of the goldenrod stem and the hovering bee! My thoughts too. It will make a versatile image for use on all of his products. Maybe labels, cards, publicity etc etc.

So the next stage is the, almost, final rough.. I will tweek it a bit more for the final painting but it’s one I am looking forward to.

I have been out in the garden again, this time giving the shed a bit of TLC. Dave my good neighbour, who is going to help with re-roofing said shed, tells me it is a summerhouse. He is a man of optimism and some imagination.

Purging Buckthorn… again, and a sap green sketch.

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 16:55:00 +0000

Yesterday I wrote about my Purging Buckthorn Rhamnus cathartica and the “sap green” pigment which was once extracted from its berries. Today a few more notes.
In this mild autumn the spinney by the shed still has quite a few leaves. If you are drawing trees it’s a good idea to sketch the whole thing because they all have very different overall shapes. It’s a way of getting to know them.

Some leaves are still green, some have turned yellow and do look quite pretty, and some are in-between, with delicate two tone patterns. (I did use some sap green in this sketch.. the modern version though.)

The bark of the mature tree/shrub is actually quite attractive. It is dark almost glossy, a dark purple brown and striped with prominent pale lenticels. These are raised pores on the surface of bark which facilitate the exchange of gases from the inside of the plant to the outside and vice-versa. There are a lot of them on this plant. Some have greened over with lichen.

The spines seems to grow on every part of the plant, below a sketch of a small branch we pruned yesterday. One massive thorn is 5 inches long very robust and very sharp. The immediate cut surface of the bark is a cinnamon brown. The largest clump of buckthorn comprises a group of 5 or 6 trunks twining affectionately around each other. We took about 10 smaller ones out yesterday and have liberated the small shed.

Twigs are good things to draw and if you are interested in identifying winter twigs you can download this very nice free chart from the Woodland Trust here

Winter twigs Woodland trust

It was much colder today.. our first UK winter for 8 years is definitely on its way. Brrr…

Getting to Know the Garden: No 1, The spiny “Purging Buckthorn”.

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 17:57:00 +0000

It’s one of the first things to do with a new garden. Go out and see what you already have. I am starting, sensibly with things that still have leaves.

To the left of the shed there is a tall scrubby, straggly, suckering, thorny thing which apart from the depressing leylandii on the eastern boundary is the biggest thing in the garden.
I am pretty sure it is a buckthorn, Rhamnus cathartica I think. It has sent up long side shoots forming itself into a little spinney which is slowly surrounding and imprisoning the small tool shed.. (Yes I am a two shed girl! lucky me..) You would not have noticed the little shed before some of the leaves fell from the buckthorn. It was quite a surprise to find it.
However I am not a big fan of this shrub..each branch is armed with vicious spines and it is no beauty.. but it is a native tree and is the food source for both Brimstone butterfly and equally spiny Tiger Moth caterpillars. Hopefully in the spring I will see some of these pretty brimstone butterflies feeding on the flowers.

Brimstone Butterfly and its caterpillar feeding on buckthorn. Images by Sarefo and Harald Süpfle from Wikipedia.

Why Purging Buckthorn? Because its bitter black berries are an alarmingly good purgative…one I have not yet tried, I hasten to add…

Then, just after I had my flesh ripped to the bone by one of its thorns and was wondering if it should all be dug up, and burnt, I read this:

Sap Green, Or Verde Vessie, is a vegetal pigment prepared from the juice of the berries of the buckthorn…. It is usually preserved in bladders, and is thence sometimes called Bladder Green; when good it is of a dark colour and glossy fracture, extremely transparent, and of a fine natural green colour. Though much employed as a water-colour without gum, which it contains naturally, it is a very imperfect pigment, disposed to attract the moisture of the atmosphere, and to mildew; and, having little durability in water-colour painting, and less in oil, it is not eligible in the one, and is totally useless in the other.

from Chromatography or, A treatise on colours and pigments, and of their powers ... By George Field, 1835 read more from Google books here.

Well how fascinating! And there are many other references to sap and bladder green and to the dyes which could be obtained from this unfriendly plant. Other accounts are not quite so damning.

OK, so a reprieve for this now-more-interesting shrub, for a while, at least. My friend John over on his blog Nuncketest who is busy making his own paints might just note this down for a bit of an experiment :).

I know buckthorn has gone “invasive” in the USA…maybe just another European who saw those high, wide and fabulously open spaces and understandably went wild. Who can blame it. This particular European is feeling a little hemmed in, having been put firmly back in her small UK box, for now.

Purging Buckthorn, Rhamnus cathartica

Only a quick pencil sketch and notes for now. I have spent all day trying to get the heating sorted out and weather proofing the sad neglected fence. Tomorrow, hopefully a “sap green” sketch..

Moving..to the Ugly Bungalow.

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 08:24:00 +0000

We have just moved into the new house. House sounds too grand because in reality it is a small bungalow and a pretty ugly one at that. But we did need a home. This is our 10th move in 8 years, 8 years of rentals in 3 different countries.. so we really did need home, even if it's just for a year or two. We were sad to leave the tiny humming cottage which was full of mason bees but who knows what I will find here.

I had driven past this “for sale” bungalow many times thinking how ugly it was, but eventually, in desperation to find something in our price range I came to see it. It’s the best I can do and I will try to learn to love it, but “silk purse/sow’s ear” keeps creeping into my mind.

I remember someone writing to me in my early blogging days thinking I lived in a picturesque cottage in the country with a glorious garden and having to tell them we lived in a city in a tiny, hot, 2nd floor concrete box of an apartment with paper thin walls and nightmare neighbours. I often wondered if they were disappointed, if that somehow I was less of a real artist because my location did not quite fit the romantic ideal.
I found a book once in a shop. It was called “Artists Studios”. Photographs of impossibly dreamy rooms in impossibly dreamy settings. I picked it up and looked through it, wondering where I had gone wrong? I returned to the hot box and drew the beautiful leaf of an exotic plant whose origins lay in distant lands and whose story of discovery was incredible and the hot box became a irrelevant.

The one thing that stuffy apartment had going for it was that it was within cycling distance of my much loved Leu Gardens and the Ugly Bungalow is 5 minutes walk from the shimmering water of the reservoir, so despite its dreary looks I count myself extremely lucky. I will breathe some life and soul into its plain walls, fill its empty garden with bee flowers and line its rooms with books. And surely, if my observations of life have taught me anything, it is that external appearances should not matter….. (but a pretty cottage would still be quite nice.. maybe next time :)….)

So here we are. The internet is up, we have a bed and two kitchen chairs. It’s a start. And the poor Ugly Bungalow does have a garden and I am ridiculously excited about its possibilities. It too is a blank canvas, mostly grass, with heavy clay soil and a few shrubs. I know there is a little apple tree and, joy of joys, a dilapidated shed! Today I took my father's heavy spade and dug my first flower bed.. a mere 2ft x4.. I had forgotten how hard it is to dig! ..but slowly slowly I will get there.. there are plans for a pond, and some veg... and many other things. and a few drawings in between ... :)

A Start…… a tiny 4” square sketch, my spade and boots and the fledgling flower bed..

Pretty Peponapis pruinosa: A Squash Bee for Joanna.

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 10:26:00 +0000

This is going to be my last bee painting for a week or so. We are about to move (yet again)and things will be a bit upside down, but this was one request I could not resist.

Joanna emailed me recently from Canada. She is fond of Squash bees.. how could you not be! I had written about them briefly when I first learnt about the wonderful Long horned Eucerini bees back in 2009. The Peponapis bees are in the same family and they are very--yes I am going to say it-- they are very cute. Sadly we don’t have them here in the UK and although I saw the beautiful black Mellisodes bees on the squash flowers in Leu gardens in Orlando I did not see these little stripy charmers.

This photo is from an article in Science Daily, here about how good these bees are as pollinators. They apparently come out earlier in the day than honey bees, get on with lots of energetic pollination then sleep in the afternoon.

Squash bee flying onto a squash flower. (Credit: Photo courtesy of Holly Prendeville, University of Nebraska)

Towards the end of her University degree in Agriculture Joanna published a paper commissioned by the North American Pollinator Protection Campaign about the decline of native pollinators.

She writes: “Peponapis pruinosa, the Squash Bee holds a special place in my heart and I've been waiting for some time now with fingers crossed that you might paint this bee, but it recently occurred to me that I could easily contact you directly and make a request.

This Squash bee is a solitary bee and the females make ground nests. The males spend their time in and about squash flowers - and they sleep there after the flowers close in the afternoon. I spent an interesting few weeks with a professor once spending late afternoons on a squash farm going from flower to flower, opening them up to count the resting bees. There is a mathematic correlation between the number of male bees in squash flowers in a given area to the number of females in the ground nests. By counting the bees, the professor was able to determine how many females were in the area.”

Don’t squash the squash bees.

I can’t think of a nicer afternoons’ occupation than opening up squash flowers to count these sweet little bees. The males will overnight in the flowers and should you wish to see if you have any of them sheltering in your squash flowers you can give the closed flowers A VERY GENTLE squeeze. A sleepy buzzing may be your reward … but don’t squash the squash bees. Remember they are super pollinators for your curcubita crops.

I was of course delighted to draw a squash bee. Here is the stripy male poised on the edge of a squash flower (from a photograph of a Leu Gardens squash flower ) on the lookout, as ever, for a female.
A quick sketch to get the feel for the composition:

Peponapis pruniosa, The Squash Bee

Pencil and watercolour on Arches HP, 9 x 9 inches

If you would like a print of this pretty bee drop me an email!

A Buzz in your Ears……some Bee Earrings

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Sat, 12 Nov 2011 09:59:00 +0000

I have, for the last year or so worn some very sweet little bee stud earrings given to me by my friend Brenda in the USA. I am very fond of them and I am always looking out for other bee jewellery. In the summer I went to the wonderful Birdfair at Rutland Water. It’s a fabulous event. Representatives from almost every country in the world offer holidays, safaris and birding trips to die for. There are cameras and binoculars bigger than anything I have ever seen before, demos, book stalls, info on birds and wildlife and of course some fabulous artists.
Jewellery designer Anna De Ville from Birmingham was there and her silver, nature inspired pieces are just gorgeous!

Her website is www.annadeville.co.uk

I was admiring her earrings and brooches and as we were chatting, I asked her if she had ever made any bees… “No”, she said… “Well”, I said, “They’re rather nice and lots of people are very fond of them”
A few weeks later Anna emailed me .. she had got the BUZZ! and was working on two bee designs.

Here they are: If you are looking for some pretty silver bee earrings just drop her a line.
The tiny bee studs…. which retail at £25.00 per pair

And the Bumble Bees, Bombus terrestris, which look rather like little flowers as well, they retail at £55.00 per pair.

,

My photos do not do them justice They are lovely quality, hallmarked and made with great care.
Nice Christmas pressies for bee lovers!

Snail Shell Bees: Days 4 and 5. Finishing stages and a word about my paints.

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 16:37:00 +0000

The last stages of a painting can be the most nerve racking and the most rewarding. Will I overwork it? Will I drop paint, tea or coffee on it. Will it look anything at all as I had hoped?
I had decided right at the start to add some colour to the main snail shell and the pine needles. I wanted a little more colour in this painting to help unite everything, but without cluttering the image with too much detail.

Unfortunately I did forget to take step by step photos of this stage. ( just when my friend John had congratulated me on remembering!!). When I work, I put the radio on and listen to plays, discussions, poetry, book reviews and news etc etc and tend to get engrossed in both the work and what I am listening to and forget to get the camera out.

It took me two more days to finish the painting. I worked over many areas of the pencil to iron out any wobbles and keep the tones balanced. I painted the shell lightly, worked on the twigs and leaves and added the little boat sailing by the Needles.

Then strengthened the shell colour again and some more of the pencil work.

Here it is about finished. It all looks rather too dark and contrasty compared with the original, in reality it is softer, but this gives you an idea. Pencil work is very hard to either photograph or scan.

The Snail Shell Bees, Osmia bicocolour and the Needles.
Watercolour and Pencil on Fabriano Artistico HP. 12.5 inches x 14.5 inches

Was I pleased?… Yes, thankfully,I was. It’s no fun to work on something for a week and then hate it! But, believe me, sometimes it does happen. But I have become very involved with these two bees and their little world and will be sad to see them go.

I always put a piece away for a few days before sending it off to its new home. Niggles will disappear and glaring errors may become more apparent but there does come a point at which you have to stop! As I write this the painting is in the post!

Seeing the Snail Shell Bees in real life

I would so like to see these wonderful little bees in real life. I have of course watched the wonderful films on the Internet which I spoke about in my previous posts. I know they are not common or perhaps are under recorded but to my delight I recently found a couple of reports of sightings not too far away from here. One further north near Peterborough from April this year on Mollyblobs blog here and another one in Bedfordshire by Keith Balmer on Bedfords Fauna and Flora Blog here with a wonderful photo of the female bee flying with a twig. Thanks to you both for posting about them.

This gives me hope and next year I may be lucky!

A quick word about my Graham Paints.

I am about to write a small piece about my bee paintings for the good people at Graham Paints in America. I started using their gorgeous rich and creamy watercolours when I was in the USA. I painted my first set of bees for Deborah with them and all my “Buzz” bees for the exhibition.

Not only are they rich but they have a slight sheen to them when they are applied thickly. I do use quite thick paint and like to push it around quite a bit even on a small scale and I like the sheen. About half way through Deborah’s commission I was reading a bit more about them and discovered this:….
from M Graham’s Website:

“Our watercolor is created with exceptional amounts of pigment in a time honored binding medium of pure gum arabic and natural blackberry honey
Why Honey?
As an essential ingredient in our binding medium, honey contributes to moistness for smooth, easily controlled applications, increased pigment concentrations and freedom from reliance on preservatives. Because of the honey medium, our color resists hardening on the palette, or in the tube. It dilutes easily, often after months of disuse.!

… and it’s all true. It seems a poetic coincidence that I am painting bees with blackberry honey paints! … :)

They are wonderful paints… more on this in a separate post.

Snail Shell Bees: Step 3, Some Background

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 14:19:00 +0000

Day three is starting the pencil background. I sketch it out a little bit more on tracing paper, to get a feel for what I am doing and how it will look. I don’t normally use trace-down unless something has to be very accurate, it’s slow going enough, without drawing things over and over again.

My first encounter with snail shell bees was when I read Animal Architecture by Karl Von Frisch. He describes the laborious covering of the nest with twigs. Here is Turid Holldobler’s Illustration of the bee carrying a twig to her nest.

But then here is Walter Linsenmaier’s illustration from “Insects of the World”. In my previous blog post A Bee on a Broomstick I seemed to think that the Linsenmaier’s drawing was first. On the left, on the cutaway diagram of the shell showing the cell cavaties, he has included the male and an opportunist predatory jewel wasp.

He draws the shell covered with pine needles and I particularly liked the idea of including them, because, the additional details for the background will include “The Needles” the famous rocks on the Isle of Wight and there are pine trees on the island too.
(It’s just these little connections that make things more interesting for me.. even if no one else ever knows.)
Linsenmaier writes:

“Some species drag the shell into a hiding place before or after constructing a nest in it. Taking firm hold of the ground with repeated bites they grasp the shell with their legs and haul it after them. Some apply plant paste to parts of the slippery shell enabling their feet to get a firm grip. A few species bury the shell in sandy soil others protect it with a cover of interwoven pine needles or straws fetched individually in flight and some disguise it with moss and other things. It is ever a new experience to observe how objectively and with what careful testing such bees work and how penetratingly thorough is their interest in their productions.”

So I decided to give the female a pine needle to carry and, in the middle distance, I added a little shell with its pine needle camouflage. I based the foliage and twigs on a photo I took in the summer and I have some shells and some pine needles to work from, again collected locally.

Pine needle and the Needles :)

This was a hard working 9-10 hour day. There were many decisions, much hesitation and lots of pencil sharpening.

Snail Shell Bees Step 2: Ginger and Black

noreply@blogger.com (sharp green pencil) — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 19:22:00 +0000

The second stage of the Snail Shell Bees was the female. Female Osmia bicolours are very striking bees. I saw one in the summer at Heligan. Her ginger and black colouring is very beautiful.

The first sketch

Then I curved her over more for a more dynamic pose and inclined her head a little, to look more at us.

Slowly building up…

She like most bees is larger than the male and he is not so colourful.

I take the protective coverings away to see where I am with them both and begin to roughly and lightly sketch in the foliage. It’s fine to do this as long as it’s lightly and with a soft pencil. It can all be erased later. I know the photos are not brilliant but I can’t use a flash because it bleaches everything out.

Still fairly clean.. end of day two.