Spring At Last!

This has felt like the longest winter!  I'm used to the trees budding relatively sooner, but they've only just recently started.  Crocuses are in full bloom on campus (unfortunately I don't have my camera on me at school, so no photos) and daffodils are finally getting ready to bloom.  Or, they're actually blooming, which might just be the most beautiful thing I can think of at this moment:

Equally exciting is how golden the branches of my willow are getting, and its catkins are starting to bud.  The lilacs and red maples are budding as well.  I'm so excited! I've been ready for it to be Spring since New Year's!

Golden Weeping Willow catkins

 Budding lilacs

Red Maple buds

Blue Spruce

This Colorado Blue Spruce has been standing in our side lawn since before we got the house back circa 1992, which makes it the oldest coniferous tree on our property and the only coniferous tree we didn't plant ourselves.  This tree is easily identifiable by its silvery blue-green color from which it gains its name.  Its needles, which are an inch to an inch and a half long, are stiff and prickly (which has always left red marks on my hands and arms whenever I've handled a spruce).  A nice thing about the Blue Spruce is that it is very hardy; it'll grow in just about any soil, including clay.  It does need full sun to grow, but grows well while young at a slow to medium growth rate.  They typically mature at fifty to seventy-five feet in height and have a ten to twenty foot wide spread. 

A fun thing about my specific Blue Spruce is that there's a less branchy area near its base where I can crawl under it and chill for a while.  I could lie down with my head by its trunk and take this picture:

Blog Roll

I would like to take a moment to point out the blog roll I created on the right side of this page.  While I get my blog up and running, you should check out some of these already well-established blogs.  Some of the blogs are by my classmates with similar topics, and I’m eager to hear their wisdom.  The blog I would particularly like to draw your attention to, however, is treeblog.co.uk.  I think this man is brilliant.

Ash started this blog in February of 2007 with the intention of planting seeds of various tree species, starting with Scots Pine, cider gum, and gray alder.  His blog chronicles their growth (and the growth of other sets of seeds he’s planted) from germination to maturity.  His blog also includes some science bits, some news bits, and photos and observations from walks and field studies.  Trees are his element, and I greatly look forward to learning a lot from his blog as I read more of it. 

My Very First Blog!

Welcome to my very first blog ever!  This blog has been created primarily for my Writing and Computers class at West Chester University, so bear with me if the blog ever starts to read like an assignment.  Hopefully, I’ll keep this blog up even after the class ends, because, fortunately, the topic of our blogs has been left open to us.  Whenever I have an open topic for a class, I get very excited about trees.  Since this blog is for school (and I’ve never blogged or really read blogs before) a lot of posts may end up seeming rushed and filled with inexperience, and to be frank, I’m not sure about what sort of format I want to go for yet.  I know I want to set up something about tree identification.  I get giddy every time I find myself able to identify a tree, so let’s make this a learning experience together!  I’ll probably start out sticking to my immediate area: the woods around my house, the trees on campus, and trees around where I work and volunteer.  I’ll take a photo of a tree, do my best to identify it, and blog to you, my dear reader, about everything I can find out about that species. 

I haven’t decided yet all the content I’ll post, but some ideas I have are tree mythology, gender, carbon sequestering, care, and holistic medicines.  I’ll definitely include how to identify that species of tree by leaf shape, bark texture, and fruit.  I’m no expert, so if you spot an inaccuracy, please let me know and we can correct that mistake.  If I don’t feel 100% certain of some information, I’ll let you know my doubts about it.  I’m not here to make wild claims.  I’m here to expand my tree knowledge.