We took a field trip yesterday to hang out with our neighbors, the Duponts. Sort of. Actually, I found a Groupon for half-off admission to
Longwood Gardens. If you are looking for a reason to come visit us up here in PA, this is it. Ted & I concur that even paying full price admission is a deal. This might be as close to Shangri La as you're gonna find, and it's less than 10 minutes from my house.
Mr. Camera got some nice shots.
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| Yellow Swallowtail on Lantana |
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| What is that weird hummingbird insect looking thing? |
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| A baby hummingbird? |
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| Nope. A Hummingbird Moth. It mimics a hummingbird. Nature is so cool. |
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| We took a pic of this b/c I want something for the garden that is tall, red and in bloom right now. We have no idea what it is? |
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| Very cool idea. Didn't get a picture of the actual lantana tree. |
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| Angel Trumpet. Want this. |
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| Bog Garden Envy |
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| Everyone should have their own formal Italian Fountain Garden. |
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| Always kiss the frog ladies. |
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| Do we have a place for this? |
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| And this bell tower? |
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| Idea for shaded area in back of our property. Again, no pic of actual plant. |
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| Kewl |
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| The Eye of Water |
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| Where are we gonna put the Conservatory? |
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| So we can have indoor fountains. |
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| Every home needs a wall of green leading to the bathrooms. |
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| We could get used to waking up to this. |
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| And this. |
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| And this. |
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| Behind the scenes view of the Longwood Organ. |
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| It's a huge organ. Minds out of the gutter people. |
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Farmer Ted wrote & performed a song about me.
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| For all of you familiar with Ted's songs, see if you can find it. |
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| For those not familiar with Ted's songs. |
Scenes from the orchid room.
Ginger?
My favorite was the water garden.
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| Idea for when we add our water feature. |
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| Lotus |
More random conservatory.
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| Who knew bananas flowered? |
The succulent garden.
We'll spare you the 500 other pictures we took.
Except for a few final shots...
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| Fountain display at night. |
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| Farmer Ted needs to work on the night pics. |
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| Hey Mr. Dupont, we Wannabe Farmers. Let us know when our room is ready. |
The larvae of the hummingbird moth is the tomato hornworm. So if you allow the destruction of your tomatoes, you too might have a hummingbird moth. Personally, I don't think it's worth it; I want to eat my own tomatoes.
ReplyDeleteGreat shots! Ted - the night shots - just crank up the ISO (yes, they will be a brit grainy) reduce the speed and shoot at about a 7.1. The lack of blur will make up for the higher ISO. You could also dropp $8k on f2.8 zoom lems as well, but changing the your setting is a lot cheaper......
ReplyDeleteThe water garden was about the coolest thing out there... Those big ass disc shaped things are called water platters. I WILL have a water platter or two whenever we get around to creating our water feature; and who knew about the black dye? So they say... You dye the water black so that the sunlight doesn't create the algae and shit! (Pretty cool.)
ReplyDeleteHummingbird moths! This thing was crazy as hell... It mimicked a hummingbird to a tee... It flew backwards... Sideways and it was FAST AS SHIT! The antenna was the only reason that led us to believe that it wasn't a baby hummingbird; Anyways...
This place offers a two year degree in Horticulture... (Free!) I'm talking about Certified degree...(For free!) I think that I read somewhere that if you wanted to continue your education in it... The 4 year degree is free as well. Farmer Ted's gonna be looking into THIS. Who in their right mind (with time on their hands) would pass up a free degree? I guess that they do it that way to keep up with the upkeep of this place... It's like 1100 acres of nothing but BAD ASS!
THIS I will say about Longwood Gardens... I've never seen more foreigners in one place at the same time! I take that back... Whenever the Olympics was held in Atlanta..... THAT was the most foreigners that I've ever seen in one place but it was a SHIT TON of 'em there yesterday; It was like... Everyone hauled ass from India to Longwood Gardens. It was pretty cool seeing many cultures enjoying the beauty that Mr. Du Pont envisioned. (I'm sure that he DIDN'T envision that fuckin' stink ass "Hippy oil" that foreigners seem to love so much! I think that it's called Patchouli! (I think that shit stinks like 'ol nasty ass.)
That place looks amazing! and what beautiful pics!! Anna
ReplyDeleteFarmer Ted has never been to Disney World during tour group season!! OY! =0)
ReplyDeleteThat place looks absolutely beautiful!!!! Terrific shots especially of the humming bird moth.
After scrolling through those beautiful photos, I am sitting here with tears in my eyes and a huge smile on my face. When we lived in Jersey, Longwood Gardens was the place that Mom and I went for inspiration and peace. How we loved it there! We even took baby Renee before we moved to NY; she crawled all around that shady area with the huge trees! Sigh...one day, I will return there.
ReplyDeleteFarmer Ted, those water platters are amazing, aren't they? Mom and I put in a 10X20 ft pond after seeing them...lol!