Tag: leaf

Leaf of the Day: Bauhinia or Butterfly Tree

  By

On the nearby charmingly named Gay Rd is a small retirement complex and this lovely tree must bring delight to whichever lucky resident has an adjacent room. I am presuming, from this leaf, that it is the Bauhinia purpurea: Purple Orchid-Tree
This genus of tree was named to honor the work of the Bauhini brothers, 16th century Swiss botanists and herbalists who each wrote extensively on horticulture and the use of plants.
There are many varieties of Bauhinia and in India, the Apta, as it is known, is celebrated both in myth and for its medical uses especially in ayurvedic medicine. In legend, the tree was showered with gold during a fight between Kuba the god of wealth and King Raghu. I think that is a very beautiful image and one of the observances of festival of Dussehra is the exchange of Apta leaves as a symbol of a gift of gold.

Leaf Description
This beautiful leaf is bi-lobed, so really made up of twin leaflets, joined in the middle and I have seen other examples that are more deeply divided. The interesting shape also earns it the name butterfly tree or more prosaically, cow’s foot. I have a proper botanical description of these leaves from the AgroForestryTree Database
“Leaves have minute stipules 1-2 mm, early caducous; petiole puberulous to glabrous, 3-4 cm; lamina broadly ovate to circular, often broader than long, 6-16 cm diameter; 11-13 nerved; tips of lobes broadly rounded, base cordate; upper surface glabrous, lower glaucous but glabrous when fully grown”

Taxonomy
And I am learning more about the taxonomy of plants too.. so here, for the scholarly, from the USA Department of Agriculture is the correct classification for the lovely butterfly tree.
Kingdom: Plantae ( plants)
Subkingdom: Trachebionta (Vascular plants)
Superdivision: Spermatophyta (Seed plants)
Division: Magnoliophyta (Flowering plants)
Class: Magnoliopsida (Dicotyledons)
Subclass: Rosidae
Order: Fabales
Family: Fabaceae (pea)
Genus: Bauhinia
Species: Bauhinia purpurea (butterfly tree)

There is so much to learn and understand… what joy!____________________________________________

The Butterfly Tree

Leaf of the Day: Chinese Holly, a glabrous leaf.

  By

As I left the supermarket this morning, a little white dog, who was enthusiastically sniffing the planted borders of the car park, sprang up in the air like a rocket, yelped and fled back to his owner. I wanted to investigate and thought it just might be the extremely venomous and to-be-avoided-at-all-costs, diamond backed rattle snake. I took a rather tentative look as today, of course, I had forgotten to bring with me my professional snake tongs and sack. Thankfully there was no snake but an aggressive and very ferocious Chinese Holly bush which resisted my attempts to snatch a leaf with grim determination.
However here are 3 leaves, gathered at some personal cost as this low lying dense and prickly shrub has leaves of steel with needle like sharp points which stick out all directions and directly in to your flesh.

My plan for the leaf chart will have to wait for a day or two but this holly is a very good example of a leaf with a glabrous surface .. yes… glabrous means smooth and in botanical terms is the opposite to pubescent which of course means hairy! There are many different grades of hairiness and I look forward to my first samples of floccose, strigose and villous leaves.

Sitting on my drawing table these funny leaves looked like bizarre and aggressive insects. Their Latin name is ilex cornuta.. ‘cornuta’ meaning horned, very appropriate.
My aim here is to show the top surface as smooth and shiny, the underside as duller and paler. I have not exaggerated the spines.
For those wishing to hear the name beautifully said in Italian go here!!!!! I am finding some more and exciting audio clips to add occasionally so stay tuned.
__________________________________________________

Chinese Holly

Leaf of the Day: Firecracker and Tornados

  By

Yesterday evening a storm swept over Winter Park bringing with it ominous warnings from the weather man of possible “tornadic” activity. The rain was torrential and we had a spectacular display of thunder and lightening, so it’s quite apt that today’s leaf ( if you can spot one ) is from the Firecracker bush.

This untidy plant, russelia equisetiformis, flops over and through the railings near the pool and I have hesitated to draw it before as I couldn’t find the leaves. Well they are there.. but very tiny and referred to in one book as ‘scale like’. At regular intervals along the main stem there are 5 little leaves arranged in a whorled formation. 5 stems radiate from the leaf bases and these in turn bear two or three of the brilliant red tubular flowers which give this bush its name. My sample here was somewhat bedraggled after the storm and the plant is not looking its best, but new growth is starting with a very upright, thicker new main stem and with more pronounced leaves.

Tomorrow I am planning another leaf chart. I am keen to explore the word.. glabrescent; ie becoming glabrous in age.. I am sure you are too!
__________________________________________________

Firecracker Bush

Leaf of the Day: Maiden Grass

  By

Today’s daily drawing is the maiden grass leaf. I have been putting off drawing a long slender leaf like this as it requires a steady hand and more concentration. These spiky variegated plants liven up the borders of the apartment gardens, the mall across the road and most of the public spaces in Orlando it seems. The little lizards shoot in and out of their cover as you walk by and sometimes pose nicely for a photograph.
This will be a linear shape leaf with parallel venation.
Its one of the miscanthus family

_________________________________________

Maiden Grass

Leaf of the Day: Tassel Flower

  By

The Tassel Flower is a pretty little weed. It caught my eye when I first came to Florida. It’s very unassuming and inhabits scrub and waste ground which is exactly where this came from, just by the side of the main road by the apartment. It looks very much like a dandelion type of plant. The same sort of flower and a similar leaf. I am not sure exactly how to describe this leaf. Its most interesting feature is that the flowers are not yellow but a very beautiful reddy orange! My next post will, I think, be a leaf shape chart as I need to get more familiar with the names.
Its Latin name is Emilia Javanica.
__________________________________________________

Tassel Flower

Leaf of the Day: Water Plantain and Carl Doddies

  By

A leaf from the lake at Shady Park on Morse Avenue in Winter Park. It’s not very shady.. at least the lakes aren’t. I walked there today and again there were some delightful birds. This time a little flock of very skittish white ibis. They were rushing about, up and down the banks of the lake and unlike the herons they move very quickly. A big grey heron floated backwards and forwards across the water casually avoiding an annoying yappy poodle. Charlie’s owner admitted that despite his bravado he is quite nervous of these big regal birds. I can see his point.

This rather simple leaf is not so simple to draw, with those long, simply curving lines! The vein pattern was interesting and of course, learning that it was a plantain, I could see the leaf resemblance to the common plantain which reminded me of Carl Doddies, a game we used to play when we were young.
_________________________________________________

Water Plantain

Leaf of the Day: Geranium

  By

Today I went out early again and found a very funny little heron. It was stalking something very very slowly. Even the slowest photographer would have been able to get a good shot. I have never seen such incredible slow motion walking.
Unfortunately I didn’t have my sketchbook with me but took some photos. I will post these and others soon, linked to Flickr .
This geranium leaf is a small, very ordinary type, just two tones of green. Some geraniums were hit by the freeze but not too badly. I am not sure of this variety.

A word about the drawing
At the moment I am just using ordinary cartridge paper in a sketchbook for these first drawings, so, when doing fine shading, the texture of the paper tends to be picked up and the pencils can catch causing uneven shading. I will use Bristol board or a HP watercolour surface for the bigger and more complicated drawings. Many years ago I used to use Schoellershammer 4R which was a super hard surface paper for ink and pencil with just a nice bit of tooth. I am not sure if it is still available ..I think they have reissued the 4G .. ( very smooth) which I will try to find here. If anyone knows of a supplier I would be very grateful.
________________________________________________

Geranium










image 5″x6″

Leaf of the Day: Dandelion

  By

Just a quick little drawing today as I have been out and about taking photos and doing some on the spot sketching.This one grows along with the dollarweed in the shrubbery. It’s a young small leaf only 4 inches long. I dont know what species it is there are only leaves at the moment.
________________________________________________

The Dandelion

Leaf of the Day: Moneywort or Dollarweed

  By

What a delightful little weed this is. It has insinuated itself into the plant borders and grassy bits of wasteland here with some success. You can’t help but appreciate its fragile qualities which are undoubtedly offset by its invasive and tenacious roots and its clever way of creeping along.. some roots and stems spring from the same point, then it must shoot out a runner and repeat itself and on and on.. It would be very interesting to see its progress in a time-laspse film
It is tiny.. the biggest leaves are about 1″ in diameter. The biggest leaf here is only 3/4 of an inch. The shape is peltate. I am going to draw a chart of the different shapes very soon.
I have a fondness for some weeds and this is one of them.
__________________________________________________

Moneywort or Dollarweed

Leaf of the Day: Yet another Oak..the Scarlet Oak

  By

On an early morning mercy-dash to the chemists in the “mawl” across the road to get dental repair stuff I found this pretty leaf. Its tree is decidedly deciduous and has shed quite a few more leaves after the freeze. There are several of these dainty trees decorating the car park of the store and I would imagine they are ornamental oaks, not growing too big to uproot either the carpark, or the store. The leaf shape, without the indents, would be much rounder than my other oaks. Its a beautiful colour as it has its autumn tints still.. red gold green and yellow.. (colour will follow, its a promise)
__________________________________________________

Scarlet Oak










image size 6 x 7″