Fun with Nature, #11

Welcome to a widely known springtime flower which is commonly called;

The Dandelion - a weedy yellow flower that promises to reseed itself soon after it turns to fluff.

The yellow floral dandelion is one we all know which pops their heads up in springtime - everywhere to be exact! It's the one wild flower which quickly becomes an eyesore with it's stark contrasting changes from being bright yellow in the early phase to its "white wishies" ugly end.

All children love to pick them at this stage of the game, don't they? And in a second they make a wish and then very quickly muster up deep breaths of air for blowing all of the seeds off their stem, blasting them up into the air like a space ship blasts off into orbit. As they stand mesmerized while watching them subsequently drift throughout the air and fly about before landing on the ground, they aren't aware of the obvious, because in turn these lovely "wishy" seed-blowing temptations are guaranteed to provide new copious amounts continued dandelions for years to come. Over time they don't require help at all because the wind assists by sending zillions of these seeds to drift about and then effortlessly they commence settling into the ground for next year's blanket growth coverings.

In their defense, oh sure these are lovely yellow flowers which can speckle color throughout the greenest of grasses, offering a lovely zing to the area. I have a friend living in southern California who would love to trade her tumbleweeds for our pesky dandelions any day, but although they are to be admired once in a while when freshly blossoming, they often tend to take over the landscape instead of merely enhancing it.

"If dandelions were hard to grow, they would be most welcome on any lawn."

~ Andrew Mason

It's great to have them if they are not a bother to folks, perhaps out in a farmer's field rather than on your lawn, right? Our former home had "zillions" of them which fast became wage earning opportunities for our young children to pick them before they had the chance to turn back to seed again. Here on this new property they seem to have grown and lined up around the circular area of our driveway, near to the flower garden stone walls and along garden paths, definitely not where I'd like them to remain.

Yes there are wise quote-able and heartwarming words to describe the dandelion, but come on, let's be real here - at the seed stage they really do get downright ugly don't they?

I was pleased with the way the photos of our "dandelion seed stage" flowers on our property turned out above, the ones remaining that is before the shovel ends up under their roots for a good riddance salute. (grin)