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posted: March 31st, 2014 |
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This page begins and ends with March 29th and climbs of Mt. Kagenobu (727 m = 2,385 ft) for the 11th time, Mt. Kobotoke-Shiro-yama (670 m = 2,199 ft) for the 47th time and Mt. Takao (599 m = 1,965 ft) for the 103rd time. The purpose of our climbs today was to check on the progress of spring and spring flowers. We had good success and covered a lot of ground. Click on any thumbnail to begin.
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| Begin March 29th |
As the header says, on March 29th - Saturday - we went out to the countryside and climbed Mt. Kagenobu, Mt. Kobotoke-Shiro-yama and Mt. Takao. We were, of course, in search of spring flowers. We found them too, as you shall see. The first 2 shots in this row are of Euptelea polyandra (Fusa-zakura in Japanese). We saw this tree as we hiked up the road from the Bus Stop to the start of the trail. The 3rd shot is of Viola grypoceras and was also taken along the road between the bus stop and the trailhead. It appears that spring flowers are out!!
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Here are 2 more shots of Viola grypoceras lower down on the trail. The 3rd shot is one major thing which we came here in search of - the Cymbidium goeringii orchid - Shun-ran (Spring Orchid) in Japanese.
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Here are 3 shots of the Cymbidium goeringii orchid - Shun-ran (Spring Orchid) in Japanese. The center shot shows the interior really well. In the 3rd shot note that this plant has 2 flowers.
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Here are an additional 3 shots of the Cymbidium goeringii orchid - Shun-ran (Spring Orchid) in Japanese. Note that the first shot in this row is a plant which has 3 blossoms. It strikes us as interesting that in the wild we always find just single plants of this species. But, our porch the Cymbidium goeringii orchid increases in size every year. We have not shown you a photo of our porch Cymbidium goeringii in several years because it's a real bother to erase out all of the porch stuff in a photo. The most recent ones are HERE. In Row 2 on that page note how large the plant has become - that is what we have never seen in the wild. In the wild it's always just 1 plant by itself.
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In this row it's again 3 shots of Cymbidium goeringii, but the center shot is of Kazuya pointing to a single plant on a steep slope. Steep slopes in hardwood forests is where we always find them. It kind of looks like a trail there, but it is not. If anything, it is a seldom used animal trail.
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 Mar29_39_MtKagenobu_ Cymbidium_goeringiiRC |
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Here is the final shot of Cymbidium goeringii, probably until next year. The 2nd shot shows the summit marker of Mt. Kagenobu. The 3rd shot is a directional sign. We came from Kobotoke Bus Stop (3.6 kilometers), we'll continue on to Kobotoke Pass, pass over Mt. Kobotoke-Shiro-yama - which is not shown on the sign - and then continue on to Mt. Takao and take Trail #3 down Mt. Takao.
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There has been a mountain rest and snacks and liquor place here at the summit of Mt. Kagenobu for a long time - probably 50+ years. They have pictures from a long time ago. They put this tiny clearcut for viewing Mt. Fuji here a long time ago - the tree stumps are nearly all rotted away. Today was a fine day for viewing Mt. Fuji from here. The center shot shows me standing in front of a sign which points towards Mt. Jinba.
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Here are 3 more shots of Mt. Fuji taken from the summit of Mt. Kagenobu. The 1st and 3rd shots are 2-shot panoramas.
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WOW! We are already at the summit of Mt. Kobotoke-Shiro-yama. And, this is, of course, Mt. Fuji as seen from that summit. The first 2 shots were taken from approximately the same location as seen in the October 2013 Index Page (September 2013's Photos), which you can see HERE. The 3rd shot is the first Viola tokubuchiana var. takedana that we have seen this year!
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Here are 2 more shots of Viola tokubuchiana var. takedana and sandwiched in between them is a shot of a seed-tree clearcut just below the summit of Mt. Kobotoke-Shiro-yama.
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After we passed by Mt. Takao and headed down trail #3 we found the most incredible concentration of 2 kinds of violets on a small sunny hillside! The first 2 shots show Viola grypoceras and the 3rd shot shows another Viola tokubuchiana var. takedana.
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Click the above button for a Special Page dedicated to most of the Violets which we have identified with confidence. |
We are still photographing that incredible concentration of violets on a small sunny hillside. Here is one shot of Viola tokubuchiana var. takedana and 2 shots of Viola grypoceras.
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The first photo in this row shows the most area of any shot we took at the small sunny hillside covered with violets. These all appear to be Viola grypoceras. The 2nd shot is another of Viola tokubuchiana var. takedana. Now we are moving on, and the next shot is of a curious little plant - Omphalodes japonica.
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In first position in this row is the most incredible shot of Viola eizanensis. Generally the flowers of this violet are pretty much 100% white, but you can see in this photo that these have a very definite reddish color to them. The 2nd image was cropped out of the photo which is in 3rd position so that we could shot you a larger version of the flowers. Those 2 shots are of Omphalodes japonica.
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Here is a final shot of Omphalodes japonica and then a shot of Viola bissetii aka V. bisseti. We only found a few blooms of Viola bissetii today, much to our surprise.
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Here are the final 2 shots which we want to show you and they are both of Viola bissetii.
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| End March 29th, End March 2014's Photos, Begin Miscellaneous Links |
Here are links to separate web pages - all of them will open in a new window (or new tab). The first link shows some photos of our DVD Collection, an AVI Movie of our Home Theater System and 9 photos of our Sharp Aquos TV. The 2nd link shows our entire DVD collection in DVD Profiler (if you're asking yourself what might be good to rent for the weekend). The DVD's will be sorted by date purchased. You can click on the "Title" Column to sort that way if you desire. The 3rd link shows our entire DVD collection in php DVD Profiler, which is much more sophisticated than the plain vanilla DVD Profiler just above it. The 4th link takes you to a set of pages which show you the FRONT cover-art of our entire DVD collection.
