Mama’s Garden

Once again I ventured into Mum’s garden. It’s amazing what you can capture if you’re just looking closely enough. There are stunning motives everywhere. Flowers in bloom, withered flowers in the back light, beetles in rosemary, climbing wasps, cob webs and so on:

My favourites, though, are leaves with raindrops. A little dark mood gives the images an aristocratic elegance. Especially for the one with the hydrangea (Mum’s favourite flowers), which to me is the best photography in this post. Do you agree?

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Red Basil

A honey bee (Apis mellifera) is feeding on the purple basil flowers.

My mum keeps a large specimen of red basil on her front porch. When in bloom it drenches the air with its aromatic fragrance and reliably offers loads of purple flowers for nectar feeding insects. Therefore it is a convenient spot for capturing nice images of bees and butterflies. The other day I spotted a male blue (family: Lycaenidae, subfamily: Polyommatinae) among all the honey bees and I loved the contrasts of colour and shapes it provided:

At some point I noticed some turmoil in the shrub and I came to witness a dramatic fight scene within the flowers: A European paper wasp (Polistes dominula) had attacked a feeding honey bee and they wrestled for their lives while hanging on a single leg from the blossoms. Both are capable of employing deadly stings, however a few moments later the wasp darted off with its prey.

A European paper wasp (Polistes dominula) attacking a nectar feeding honey bee (Apis mellifera).

Tip: Not only the leaves of red basil are edible but also the flowers. They give a nice colourful and aromatic touch to salads, sweet desserts and even drinks (e.g. G&T). Try it out!

My mum 😉