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grayherndon.bsky.social
gray, spelled g r a y
@grayherndon.bsky.social
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grayherndon.bsky.social
Today’s photo marks day 3 in The Quest for Green Things and also marks SUCCESS!

Since it was so nice out & the ground is so soft, I decided to pull Bermuda grass from the neglected bed by the front door, & uncovered these *green* Nodding Onions (Allium cernuum).

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#2026photos #nativeplants
Several onion plants rise a few inches out of wet, clumpy soil, their leaves like flat green blades wrapped in a skin of old growth at their base. They have sprouted in a loose circle and are surrounded by various dried leaves and grasses.
February 18, 2026 at 3:18 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Progress!
The top of a rounded, mostly smooth white and gray rock appears surrounded by snow that has melted down to expose perhaps two inches of the rock. The snow has also melted away from its sides slightly. Behind it a ring of chicken wire is held in place by stakes.
February 17, 2026 at 3:32 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
For today’s photo, my second attempt to find something green happening in my yard.

Result: moss!

(I am even less able to identify this moss than I was yesterday’s lichen.)

If anyone knows a good sort of hard copy field guide for mosses & lichens & such, please let me know!

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#2026photos
Bright almost lime-green moss is pictured in close-up, looking surprisingly hairy. Around it are various dried stems, twigs, and brown leaves all scattered on otherwise bare wet ground. Bright afternoon sun slants across all of it.
February 17, 2026 at 2:31 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Went out to try & find something green to photograph today (since @wearegonnafindout.bsky.social did!) - something green did catch my eye, but not the kind I expected. I was admiring the shine the rain gave to the trunk of one of the pecans when I saw this lichen (?) on it.

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#2026photos
The trunk of a young tree is in the foreground. Its bark is mostly dark brown but with patches of reddish brown and tiny whitish dots scattered all over. The bark is mostly smooth, and is wet with rain and very shiny. There are tiny patches of pale green lichen here and there. In the background, out of focus, are green boxwood bushes and the white siding of a house.
February 16, 2026 at 3:33 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Today’s photo is of the bud on one of the branch tips of our ninebark (Physocarpus opulifolius). I just thought it looked cool!

This plant is not planted where we want it.

This plant was set down in its pot for a long time, & rooted through its pot.

I’m not sure it’s moving now… 🤷‍♀️

#2026photos
A slender tan branch with muted purple-red buds arranged alternately on its sides slants upward from right to left, with a cream-colored terminal bud surrounded by bud scales in shades of tan mixed with purple and red. Out of focus in the background are dark green boxwoods with the green of liriope under them, all surrounded by patchy snow.
February 15, 2026 at 3:23 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Today’s photo is of one of the last projects we started before it got too cold & got dark too early to work last fall. We bought a bunch of stone at a local garden center & I started figuring out where paths should lead & lining their edges with the stones.

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#2026photos
The tip of a rounded, white and gray mottled rock emerges from a layer of hardened snow as the snow around it has melted. The darkness of more of the stone is visible a little around the melted area. In the background a chicken wire cage encircles a tiny seedling tree.
February 14, 2026 at 2:51 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
For today’s photo, new blooms coming out on a witch hazel, well known for blooming this time of year, right?

Well, not if you’re in Virginia. Our native Hamamelis virginiana blooms in late fall.

This one’s a gardening oopsie! It’s H. vernalis, the Ozark witch hazel.

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#2026photos
Witch hazel blooms, like clusters of short twisty red ribbon, appear among the brown leaves from last season and along various gray-brown branches. At the tips of the branches, new leaf buds are showing. The sun is at a very low angle and is casting golden light on the right-hand side of each branch and leaf. Out of focus in the background are green bushes surrounded by snow and a blue sky with a few fluffy white clouds.
February 13, 2026 at 4:24 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
P.S. Here is a good comparison of the egg cases of various mantis species, found in an article from UMD, for reference!

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Five different varieties of mantis egg cases in shades of brown and gray are arranged in a horizontal row, with a quarter at left for scale. Each of the five has a lowercase letter from A to E under it. Across the top there is black text reading, “Mantis Ootheca of New York and the Northeastern United States.” At the bottom a key outlines the identification of the lettered egg cases: “a. Carolina Mantis, Stagmomantis carolina, native b. Asian Jumping Mantis, Statilia maculata, invasive c. Narrow-Winged Mantis, Tenodera angustipennis, invasive d. Chinese Mantis, Tenodera sinensis, invasive e. European Mantis, Mantis religiosa, invasive”
February 12, 2026 at 4:01 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
For today’s photo, who doesn’t love a good praying mantis ootheca (egg case)?!

…in this case, we don’t, & neither do you! Why? Because unfortunately, & like most you’re likely to find in our part of the US, this one is from the invasive Chinese mantis (Tenodera sinensis).

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#2026photos
A light brown, brittle-looking, slightly lumpy, vaguely rounded shape like a rough, squat cylinder made of hard foam is attached to a slender dried vine in the center of the picture, with other dried vines and stems crisscrossing the field of view and a mostly featureless expanse of snow visible between them.
February 12, 2026 at 3:56 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
OK I know we already did seeds on snow but look at all these little tiny aster seedssssss! That’s today’s photo, seeds from I believe a New England aster (Symphyotrichum novae-angliae) scattered in the snow, hopefully to spread far & wide as it melts!

#2026photos #nativeplants #virginianativeplants
In the center of the photo a number of tiny seeds are scattered across the surface of snow that is tinted blue in afternoon light. The snow around them is pitted from where seeds have caused the snow to melt. At left, the dried stems and leaves of a flowering plant stand, with dry seedheads forming little fuzzballs at the tips of stems.
February 11, 2026 at 12:39 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Today’s photo is of the trail of muddy paw prints I found this afternoon coming from under our porch.

There’s a groundhog hole under there, & as often happens, opossums and skunks sometimes share it during the winter/spring.

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#2026photos
The camera looks along the side of a screened porch at right, with lattice blocking off the space underneath. Straight ahead is a brick support post holding up a connected enclosed porch, with no lattice. A slightly muddy trail of pawprints leads across snow from underneath the enclosed porch toward the camera. At right a large white plastic lid leans against the lattice, and domed seed trays appear just in front of the enclosed porch. Various junk is just visible in the shadowy area under the enclosed porch. Small seedling trees poke up here and there through the snow.
February 10, 2026 at 2:42 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Today’s photo was taken looking up into the branches of one of our black cherry trees (Prunus serotina). By the time I went out, just these & a few other tall plants were still catching the sunlight, & I liked the way the branches shone here.

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#2026photos #nativeplants #virginianativeplants
Several branches of a small tree curve upward in a narrow cluster, the branches medium to dark brownish-gray with small white horizontal lines, with several branches catching the late afternoon sun and showing a muted shine on their right sides. The roofs of two houses appear behind the tree, as well as part of the upper story of the house on the left. The tops of other small trees just come into the frame near the bottom, and a clear blue sky is behind all of it.
February 9, 2026 at 3:58 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
We have lots of these shapes… here are some more!

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The shapes of two small curving twigs are melted into a layer of bluish snow.
February 8, 2026 at 2:26 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Today’s photo is of a twig that has melted its way down through the snow. I guess the darker color of the twig causes them to absorb that little bit more heat.

To me it looks like something from the game Operation.

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#2026photos
The curved shape of a twig with buds sticking out here and there is melted down perhaps an inch into a layer of bluish snow. The dark-colored twig is partially visible at the bottom of the crevice it has formed.
February 8, 2026 at 2:25 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
We went to a movie after work today, & it was quite dark when we got home. Between that & the snow’s surface being frozen solid again, I didn’t want to venture off the sidewalk, so photo subjects were limited!

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#2026photos
Small feathery green fronds of a plant are shown among many dead stems, brown leaves, and other old bits of plant matter. At the lower and right edges of the photo, areas of icy snow are visible.
February 7, 2026 at 3:49 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Today’s picture shows some of the colors and textures of the material we collected, trimmed, and stacked toward (we hope) using in a dead hedge.

Dead hedges can range from very neat to very haphazard, but because we are in a town setting, we would aim for the neater end!

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#2026photos
Sticks and branches ranging in size from the thickness of a pencil to perhaps an inch thick and in a variety of grays, browns, and reddish tones, all more or less straight, are shown in close-up, oriented horizontally in a stack.
February 6, 2026 at 3:39 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Today’s picture is a little black oak (Quercus velutina) I put in the ground the autumn before last. Last winter, something nibbled every bud off of it (and most of our other oak seedlings too) - but in spring it pushed out new buds and grew!

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#2026photos #nativeplants #virginianativeplants
Several stems of a tiny seedling tree emerge only a few inches from melted holes in a blanket of snow. The stems are dark grayish-brown, mottled in places with lighter gray or beige. A couple of the stems appear dead, but most are tipped with buds that appear viable.
February 5, 2026 at 1:49 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
I joined a great webinar today presented by Homegrown National Park called “Yardenalities,” about finding your design style in the context of planning a garden with native plants. It gave me lots of ideas, & helped some thoughts come together.

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#2026photos
Dark brownish-gray dry branching stems grow profusely in a shape that’s almost a circle on ground covered in snow. In the background several cut saplings lie in a pile.
February 4, 2026 at 3:44 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Today’s - toNIGHT’s - photo is cheating a bit, because in a hectic day I’d forgotten to take one. But then we saw the moon climbing up from behind the mountain, & here we are. & it counts as a garden photo because part of our grand old silver maple is silhouetted against the sky.

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#2026photos
The large limbs of a large maple tree on the right of the picture are silhouetted black against a night sky, in which the moon sits low over dark mountains and illuminates the undersides of long, thin clouds. Beneath the moon are the lights of a small city.
February 3, 2026 at 3:50 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
OK, today’s photo happened quickly (because I was frozen after hours of shoveling) & tonight’s post will too (because my head hurts awfully)… last season’s Spanish Needles (Bidens bipinnata) looking like fireworks against the snow.

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#2026photos #nativeplants #virginianativeplants
Clusters of narrow two-barbed seeds burst from the ends of long, thin stems, silhouetted against snow that appears bluish in the low light.
February 2, 2026 at 2:54 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
About 1/8”-3/16” maybe, & 3-4’ from the ground. Below the lowest branches.

Here’s another picture of a few more, along with where something seems to have laid its eggs - unsure if related. (Sorry for the bad focus on the eggy tubes!)

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Three small holes appear in a horizontal line across the trunk of a small tree in close-up, along with other dark blemishes. The holes appear reddish-brown on their inside edges. The tree is approximately 4-5 inches in diameter, its bark dark gray and split vertically by light brown cracks, with light gray areas here and there appearing elongated horizontally. In the background, out of focus, is a snowy scene.
February 1, 2026 at 1:01 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
For today’s photo, a mystery! (To me anyway, likely not to some of you fine scholars.)

Anyone know what made these holes in our little oak (Quercus sp., likely palustris [pin oak] but anyway something in the red oak group)?

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#2026photos #backyardforest #nativeplants #virginianativeplants
A closeup of the trunk of a small tree, about 4-5 inches in diameter. It grows straight, with no branching at this point, its dark gray bark split more or less vertically by light brown cracks from the growth of the tree, and covered in lighter gray patches elongated horizontally. Two small holes appear in the trunk near the middle of the picture, perhaps an inch apart, with the one on the right slightly higher than the other. The inside of the holes appears reddish brown. In the background, out of focus, is a snowy scene.
February 1, 2026 at 12:57 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Well it’s nothing to do with plants, but it’s fun - in today’s picture, the ice that slid down the roof of our new-last-year garden shed, & is now a decorative awning!

I’ll say, last year was *a year* and we weren’t able to take delivery for *6 months* after the shed was ready.

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#2026photos
The upper corner of a sage green garden shed with white trim and black hardware is shown with a sheet of ice projecting several inches off its slope on the right side. Behind it is a snowy scene of parking lot pavement and various neighborhood houses, mostly appearing to be from the early 1900s.
January 31, 2026 at 2:40 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Today’s photo is the Common Yucca or Adam’s-Needle (Yucca filamentosa) that was here when we bought the house, looking very spidery in the snow. I’m leaning over a lot of goldenrod and tall coreopsis stems to take the picture!

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#2026photos #virginianativeplants
Long, narrow dark green leaves fan out in an arched circle from a central cluster, partially buried in snow. The leaves look slightly limp and have bent in places. Around it are the light brown stems of various other plants.
January 30, 2026 at 3:51 AM
grayherndon.bsky.social
Today’s photo is one of our two pecan trees (Carya illinoinensis), with a moon caught in its branches.

It took me years to identify these! I thought they were some sort of hickory (a close relative of pecan).

Pecan isn’t native to our county, or even our state.

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#2026photos #backyardforest
The trunk and upward-sweeping bare branches of a tree are silhouetted dark gray against a blue evening sky, darkening toward the top of the photo, with wispy gray-white clouds. Between the top branches a partially visible moon glows.
January 29, 2026 at 2:03 AM