December 23, 2013 Crocuses

Welcome to the picture contest for 2013-14

Each week for the next 10 weeks I will give you 4 pictures from my garden. Since the contest had a sabbatical last winter the pictures will be from the last two seasons.
You vote for your favorite. The winner will advance to 3 weeks of finals. By that time winter will be almost over.


Picking the pictures for the contest is complicated. I have sometimes balanced such factors as color, type of flower, time of year, number of flowers in a picture.
For a while this year I am going to include all of one type per week.


This week I give you crocuses. That is the word for “squirrel food” in some language.

Here are the contestants this week. Tell me which one you like best.Use the poll function that hopefully will be at the side.

Here are some crocus thoughts and pictures before I have to go shovel snow, which is still coming down this dark Sunday morning.

I like photographing spring flowers in part because of the background. It is mostly brown which accents the colors of the early flowers. There can be such interesting shapes in that brown background. As I think about it another way to look at it is that there are no weeds.

Crocuses do clump up. Over time they can spread in interesting ways.

When combined with each other they really do put on a show. They are one of quite a few flowers where you can say “why haven’t I gotten so many more and put them everywhere.”

They are good when combined with other spring flowers too.

There you are. Week 1 of this year's contest. I do want to specially thank those of you that told me (sometimes more than once) how you missed this contest and how it helped you get through the winter. With our current weather I too need some help in getting through what may be a long winter.

Philip