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| There are 194 species of Heliconia and most must live here! Atenas, Costa Rica |
Read more about Heliconia
Or see my Flora & Forest Photo Gallery
Heliconia Bud Opens Up!
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| How the Heliconia looks today! |
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| The same one posted on July 27 – Just a bud! |
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| And one of the first flowers I see when I walk out my garden door. |
Exotic Flowers Hiding in My Garden
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| In the back corner of my garden beyond the big Heliconias and behind these Red Gingers are some tall green, leafy plants, not flower-like. |
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| If you get close, you see they kind of look like tall, leafy stalks, similar to corn, but that is not a corn cob in the back! It is the flower! |
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| If I stand on the hill above my garden and look down 1 of 4 is peaking out. |
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| This is one full-grown Maraca or Shampoo Ginger Flower |
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| Another Maraca or Shampoo Ginger |
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| And a Baby Maraca or Shampoo Ginger |
In my pre-move travels all over Central America I saw these unique tropical flower and always thought they were the most unique. Thanks to my gardeners and especially Alfredo, I now have a plant that has grown well and spread in my garden. I can now walk out my back door and see them, well, with a little searching! 🙂 They are somewhat rare and not available in all the Veveros (plant nurseries), but my good gardener Alfredo found one in his uncle’s yard for me! Be nice to your gardener and he will be nice to you! 🙂
I’m just starting my garden photo gallery but it has quite a few photos already!
Simple Beauty
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| Heliconia Bud The hint is almost as beautiful as the exotic tropical flower that will follow in my garden, Roca Verde, Atenas, Costa Rica. Shot from my little garden bench by the door. |
A Walk In the Garden!
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| Step into my main garden from the driveway or back door of house. Surrounded by the trees and other flowers of neighbors. You know you are in a tropical place! |
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| Out my backdoor you are greeted by a pottery bird garden-art by Anthony. Anthony Jeroski will soon be moving into the house across the driveway since Don & Lynda just moved back to the states. Anthony & I have plans for a garden-art bird nest made of wood & wire that will feature a glass egg made by my Nashville friend Kevin Hunter. I think you will like it Kevin! |
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| Here a garden is really your whole yard and terrace and that is true for me. With watering during the dry season, my “front yard” jungle has grown, especially the Cecropia or Guarumo tree, many palms & flowers on a slope. |
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| One is a Nance Tree which by July will have little yellow fruits I can eat! |
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| Bougainvillea is blooming on my terrace and down below on the slope. There was not one here when I came and I consider it the quintessential tropical flower I got used to in Florida and The Gambia. I have two now! |
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| Once de Abril Planta or 11th of April Plant is what my gardener calls it. It is becoming very tall and full shrub, adding to my privacy screen and it blooms year around with seasonal yellow berries that birds eat quickly. It is one of my favorite plants and was a surprise gift from my gardener. The 11th of April is Juan Santamaria Day, our only war hero. He was the drummer boy who stopped the American Walker from taking over Costa Rica as his personal slave state. DO YOU SEE THE BEE ON THE FLOWER? Click image for larger view. |
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| The largest of my 4 Heliconia plants. |
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| The brightest of my Heliconia plants. |
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| The smallest of my Heliconia plants. |
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| And the most prolific of the 4 Heliconia plants. It greets you at the driveway next to the Plumbago. |
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| Red Ginger is all over my garden & prolific. |
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| Lantanas are my border and called multiple things here. Grow fast! I have to cut them back regularly or they become shrubs! That is something like a Florida White Butterfly here today. |
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| A type of Petunia that blooms abundantly every morning, then by mid-afternoon the blooms have all dropped to the ground. More the next morning! Year-around. |
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| Flame Vine in English or Triquitraque in Spanish which literally means “firecracker” in Spanish |
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| Flame Vine or Triquitraque |
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| Plumbago is beautiful and my most prolific bloomer. My background plant. But it grows so fast I have to cut it back every few months, losing some color. But it blooms year-around and especially on the new growth after trimming. |
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| “Crown of Thorns” is what Lynda called it. I bought at Don & Lynda’s Moving Sale. |
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| Aloe Vera – I’m always ready for burn! 🙂 |
Sorry I made so many photos this morning! And that is not all of my garden! 🙂 I love it!
And this is very near the end of the dry season, meaning we have had no rain since November. I water most everything every two days. It is work but worth it! I even have green grass which is rare here this time of year. And it has been especially hot this summer or dry season. So my garden has been a lot of work! That is what it takes to have a piece of paradise! As Rudyard Kipling says . . .
“Gardens are not made by singing ‘Oh, how beautiful!’ and sitting in the shade.”
― Rudyard Kipling, Complete Verse
Passion flower & Advantages of Walking
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| Passion Flower, common name in English Granadilla del monte, common name in Spanish Passiflora vitifolia (official Latin name) |
I’m passing these a lot in my walks around town now. The flower is the reddest of any we have here I think, or at least it seems so to me. It grows on a vine that climbs walls, but only blooms near the ground for some reason. Just one of the little perks of not having a car or bike, I see pretty things on and near the ground! 🙂
“Thoreau is careful to point out that the walking he extols has nothing to do with transportational utility or physical exercise — rather it is a spiritual endeavor undertaken for its own sake.”~Maria Popova
Newly Hatched Banded Peacock Butterfly
Earlier I featured a mature Banded Peacock with most shots of top of wings. This is a younger, maybe newly hatched, with more yellowish wing bands and more brown background color than the more mature one. In my garden of course! 🙂
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| Immature Banded Peacock butterfly In my Roca Verde Garden, Atenas, Costa Rica |
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| Immature Banded Peacock butterfly In my Roca Verde Garden, Atenas, Costa Rica |
“Just living is not enough,” said the butterfly, “one must have sunshine, freedom and a little flower.” ~Hans Christian Andersen
And don’t forget that I have a Costa Rica Butterflies PHOTO GALLERY.
Jardín de la Mariposa
That’s “Butterfly Garden” in Spanish
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| I called this a Swallowtail earlier, but don’t think so after getting this view. Still researching for a name. |
I love my garden as much as my house and the many hummingbirds and butterflies are one of the reasons! Just have more trouble catching the hummingbirds with the camera.
I walk in beauty!
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| Frangipani (or Plumeria) tree in Alajuela. |
Beauty is before me.
Beauty is behind me
Beauty is above me
Beauty is below me
I walk in beauty!
– Navajo Poem
All of nature is beauty to me and in Costa Rica I feel like I am surrounded by nature more than anywhere else I have ever been. And as a walker, I truly walk in beauty! (You see more walking!)