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Urban Bird Habitat Garden

December 6, 2014April 11, 2016 Cindy at enclos*ureLeave a comment

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Last October, I posted two photos of a nice hellstrip along the west side (12th Street, N.W.) of the Smithsonian’s Museum of Natural History.

In mid October of this year I discovered the Urban Bird Habitat Garden, on the other side of the sidewalk. It’s essentially all the grounds of the museum on the north, west, and south sides (the east side is the Smithsonian’s Butterfly Habitat Garden).

The bird habitat was established in July 2012 (one of twelve Smithsonian gardens). Native trees, shrubs, and perennials were especially chosen to create “an oasis” for many of the more than 300 birds species found in Washington, D.C.

Although the garden is very narrow along 12th Street and the Mall, it was full of birdsong during my visit.

You can click on ‘Continue reading’ below to scroll through larger images of the garden. (And you can see the garden in other seasons here.)

Continue reading “Urban Bird Habitat Garden” →

The Sunday porch: small house

November 30, 2014November 29, 2014 Cindy at enclos*ureLeave a comment

Wide enough for two rocking chairs, at least. . .

New Bern, North Carolina, 1936, by Frances Benjamin Johnston, via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

Vintage landscape: sunflowers

November 29, 2014November 28, 2014 Cindy at enclos*ureLeave a comment

“An old house almost hidden by sunflowers, Rodney, Mississippi,” July 1940, by Marion Post Wolcott on Kodachrome color film, via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division on flickr.

I like the little birdhouse on the very tall pole.

Rodney was once a prosperous port on the banks of the Mississippi — until a large sand bar appeared in the 1870s and changed the course of the river. The city was left two miles from the water.

By 1933, there were fewer than 100 people living there. Today, it is considered a ghost town.

Vintage landscape: harvest

November 25, 2014April 11, 2016 Cindy at enclos*ure1 Comment

A few beautiful Kodachrome images of the season. . .

“Exhibit of crops and vegetables at the Pie Town, New Mexico, Fair,” 1940, by Russell Lee.

The story of Pie Town and of the photos Lee took there is here, in Smithsonian Magazine.

Mrs. Jim Norris canning vegetables, Pie Town, New Mexico, 1940, by Russell Lee. (You can click on the image to enlarge it.)

“Display of home-canned food,” between 1941 and 1945, photographer not noted.

All three images were taken for the U.S. Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information on the then new Kodachrome color transparency film. All via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

Oh! for a thousand pumpkin seeds,
To plant for my son John;
He says that pumpkin pies are good
When the winter time comes on.

— Robert Charles O’Hara Benjamin, from “The Farmer’s Soliloquy“

Life in gardens: happy

November 21, 2014August 20, 2017 Cindy at enclos*ure1 Comment

“Portrait of woman with infant,” ca. 1900, probably near Sydney, Australia, via Phillips Glass Plate Negative Collection, Powerhouse Museum Commons on flickr.