West Virginia Spring

.....The beautiful white flower above is the bloodroot. It is one of my favorite wildflowers. It is very delecate and comes and goes quickly. Like the trilliuun, the bloodroot grows in colonies with each plant connected. This makes it very hard to transplant.

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.....I call these wild corocuses because they have migranted from the yard to the steep hillside without any human help.

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.....These daffodils stood up in the harsh drabness of early spring. After such a harsh winter, they were a weloome delight.

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.....These white daffodils grow on the end of the ridge where there is not any home. You can walk the hollows and ridges of our mountains and find the remains of homes marked by these flowers. In a hollow off of upper Tuckahoe, I walked one day with a friend. We came upon a patch of woods that had rows of daffodils. They were persistantly guarding what used to be the Joe Vance Family Homeplace. The woods had not secceeded in vanquishing them or the memory that this was once a home.

.....This beauty was once someone's castaway. We found this magnolia in the hollow upon its side. We brought it home and nurished it

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.....When you order something through the mail, you never know what you are going to get. Carolyn thought that she was receiving two weeping cherries. She received two different kinds of trees. One of them was pink. The other was white. One is early. The other is late. This year, the white tree was almost full. The pink is yet to bloom, but it looks to be almost full also.

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.....This a photo of the white tree, the forsythia, and our oriental pear. It was supposed tobe a bartlett, but that was another surprise. It was not quite fully in bloom in this photo but it is now.

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.....Ok, this is the pink tree. This is one of the most beautiful trees that I have seen. The blooms are like little carnations.

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.....The lilacs are not to be outdone this year either.

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.....This is a wild apple blooming next to an old piece of horse-drawn machinery. These apples are also newcomers to to our hill.

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.....These next two photos are what you see on the bank as you near the top of our hill.

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.....Also, on the bank at the top of the hill, we have this gift from the birds. This is a purple plum that is quite expensive at Lowes. It is outdoing itself this year.

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.....This tree is a another gift from the birds. It grows in the field north of our home.

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.....To say that this is a red bud year would be a great understatement. They are fantastic this year. This road used to lead to a community of my good black neighbors. They are now all gone to live in town. Their grade school stood to the right of the first photo and near where I made the second photo. Their ancestors came to the ridge across from where I live just after the Civil War. I miss them.

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