Just Dandy!

I think Dandelions are resourceful, stubborn and resilient little flowers. Of course when they grow in the garden they can be a real pest, but in the fields, on the side of the roads and pathways they are a wonderful splash of colour. Hello yellow!

The flowers are little orbs of sunshine, and quite an interesting flower if you take a close look at them. In fact while I was taking pictures for this post at one point I was lying on the ground taking a closeup and a runner stopped to see if I was in trouble and needed help. I was a bit embarrassed by the encounter but when I got closeup this is what I saw:

Little curly-ques of stamens covered in pollen.

"Taraxacum officinal, the common dandelion (often simply called "dandelion"), is a herbaceous perennial plant of the family Asteraceae (Compositae). It can be found growing in temperate regions of the world, in lawns, on roadsides, on disturbed banks and shores of water ways, and other areas with moist soils." (Wikipedia)

The common dandelion is recognized for bright yellow flower heads that later turn into white or silver globes (these are the fruits and are called cypselae) that blow away on the wind. The globes or fruits are composed of pappi (the individual seed parachutes) that can drift several hundred metres on the wind and can lie dormant for years until conditions are right for germination.

No creature is fully itself till it is, like the dandelion, opened in the bloom of pure relationship to the sun, the entire living cosmos.
- D.H. Lawrence

"It gives one a sudden start in going down a barren, stony street, to see upon a narrow strip of grass, just within the iron fence, the radiant dandelion, shining in the grass, like a spark dropped from the sun."  Henry Ward Beecher

"I was a dandelion puff...Some saw the beauty in me and stooped quietly to admire my innocence. Others saw the potential of what I could do for them, so they uprooted me, seeking to shape me around their needs. They blew at my head, scattering my hair from the roots, changing me to suit them. Yet still others saw me as something that was unworthy and needed to be erased.”    Nicole Bailey-Williams

Next time you see a dandelion, don't think of it as an aggressive nuisance but instead as highly adaptive, spontaneous and assertive. Doesn't it have a lot of qualities that we value and strive for?

Close your eyes, blow and then make a wish, after all most of us are children at heart.

 I think seeing nature's wonders through child-like eyes makes us more human.

In these last two pictures I have caught a small spider sheltering on the seed head of a Dandelion after most of the "parachutes" have blown away in the wind.

 

Here is a larger picture:

"Even when we grow up we can still whisper our wishes upon the wind, as a child does in innocence, breathing their wishes at a dandelion." Jill Hanna



Here's an old favorite from Donovan, "Mellow Yellow":

Here is another splash of yellow, a watercolour of a tulip that  I call "Rays of Sunshine".

"Rays of Sunshine"

 

Here is another new work, it is a poured watercolour, called "Path of Light".

Thank you for stopping by, I love to hear your feedback.

Happy Whimsy Wednesday, until next week...