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i went to the sacramento street community garden at 8:50am this morning. the woman in charge wasn't kidding when she said my plot was "shady" - completely underneath a mulberry tree, it seemed no better than my own sun-deprived backyard. but since one of the person who was supposed to come didn't show up, i ended up taking her place instead, upgrading to a slightly better plot. still near the mulberry tree, but with a better chance of catching some sun later during the day. i paid the woman my $10 annual gardening fee and came home.

since i was already up, i decided to make a quick trip to the mt.auburn cemetery to see if i could catch some warblers in action (fact: birds are most active during the mornings). the place was crawling with birdwatchers - you couldn't turn a corner without seeing somebody with a pair of binoculars walking around looking up into the trees. i went to auburn lake, where i knew from past observations is a good spot to see warblers. i saw some right away, thought they were cerulean warblers, but saw the yellow patch on the tail characteristic of yellow-rumped warblers (they turned out to be yellow-rumped, a fairly common warbler). i also saw a baltimore oriole, singing loudly up in a tree.

there were of course many flowers at the well-manicured cemetery/arboretum. viburnums are my favorite fragrant flowering bush: their flowers resemble juicy white lilacs but the smell is very sweet with a touch of clover scent.


dogwood

rhododendrons

lilacs

daffodils

pansies

lily of the valleys

dogwood

unknown

viburnum

i came back home and had a creme cheese bagel before heading over to andrew and maura's place in malden for a short hike through the southern end of the medford fells by the town reservoir. the last time i was here in this particular area (2 years ago) there was a good amount of wildflowers. unfortunately it's still a little too early in the season so we didn't see too much. the overcasted weather and the slight drizzle didn't help matters much either. we did see garter snakes though. andrew, with his talent for spotting serpents, heard a snake running through the leaf debris, and kicked at it trying to uncover the snake. the second time i actually spotted it as it slithered off of the crushed rock path. our outing was sustained by tragedy though when maura discovered her loaner camera had a crack on the LCD screen.


corydalis

spurge

garter snake

i left malden around 4pm. when i got home i opened up all the windows to air out the house. i fell asleep on the couch while watching television. i woke up in time to watch the red sox game. for dinner i had some ramen.