This week I had a visit of two retired biology teachers from my country. They made an old dream come true with their trip to Madagascar. This island is indeed biology heaven on earth.
I invited them home and while walking around our yard they studied the trees and flowers which just started to blossom. They picked petals, showed me stems, stigmas, styles, stamens and saps; making me feel like a high school student again.
They gave me some lovely Dutch plant names, freely translated into: Mother with Baby in Lap, Little Cheese flowers, Lion's mouths, Christ's Thorn and Hole plants. They of course also knew the Latin names, so now I know we have Philondendron, Poinsettia, Coleus, Drecaenas and even Aloe Vera. Very educational.
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| Aloe Vera |
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| Philondendron |
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| Dracaena |
They even knew the species name of our two turtles, which I already forgot. I just call them Ninja I and Ninja II.
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| Ninja I |
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| Ninja II |
The only flower they could not identify was a huge yellow one, very pretty, and when they fall of they look like deflated balloons. Anyone?
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| Mystery Flower...before turning into deflated balloon |
That is a Cup-of-gold, Solandra maxima.
ReplyDeleteReally enjoy your news and pictures.
I think your pets are tortoises, not turtles??
Regards, Hugo
Very true Hugo, turtoises. In Dutch and in French there is no difference between the sea turtle and the water tortoise, they are both called 'turtles'. Hence my mistake.
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