Sweet Pepperbush - Worksheet

The plan is to go with Sweet Pepperbush for my final painting. Here are my notes on composition, initial sketches, and color mixing. I feel on shaky ground with the initial drawing--the flower spike challenges me.

Sweet Pepperbush is now in bloom just a bit up the road and I suspect there will be good subjects all week long. I may take an extended weekend to wrap things up-- a fantastic excuse to get away from the job for a while.

This species holds special meaning for me here on Nuncketest. I discovered seed pods just before Christmas 2008 and spend a good deal of time identifying. Here's a link to all my Sweet Pepperbush posts.

Sweet Pepperbush Comes Full Circle

Here's Sweet Pepperbush, Clethra alnifolia, coming around its annual cycle.

From Nature's Garden:

"Like many another neglected native plant, the beautiful sweet pepperbush improves under cultivation ; and when the departed lilacs, syringa, snowball, and blossoming almond, found with almost monotonous frequency in every American garden, leave a blank in the shrubbery at midsummer, these fleecy white spikes should exhale their spicy breath about our homes. But wild flowers, like a prophet, may remain long without honor in their own country."

From The American Bee Journal:

"The sweet pepper grows wild here in the greatest abundance in the swamps, and wet places, and I never knew it to fail to bloom from any cause whatever. Dry seasons do not affect it, because its home is generally in wet places; and again no cold appears ever to harm it. The honey is about white, thick and of fine flavor."

(Bee photo on C. alnifolia from August; all others this weekend.)

Blanchan, Neltje. Nature's Garden. 230-1. New York, 1900. Web. Google Book Search. 25 Oct 2009.

Parsons, A. The American Bee Journal. Volume 15. 58. Chicag0, January 1879. Web. Google Book Search. 25 Oct 2009.



To my dear Feedburner email subscribers: Yesterday the embedded Google map did not present well within the email. A better view can be had on the blog's post for yesterday.

Sweet Pepperbush

Sweet Pepperbush will always impart to me a special feeling. Back in some of the earliest posts, I struggled to identify this species. It was my first experience with the difficulties of identifying species--bushes that I'd never given the slightest attention. Maybe this was their payback!

As the posts have rolled along, the ID blues have never left my side. Just yesterday I popped through with a couple of new IDs. There were days of work behind the breakthroughs. To me, it is a labor of love and I consider myself lucky to have stumbled upon such an endeavor.

So here we finally get to see flowers! They have been long coming--I have been shooting buds for weeks, always anticipating a quick blossom. This is a very patient bush.


From A Guide to the Wildflowers:

"One of the joys of the late season is the bursting into bloom of the clethra. Its delicate blossoms and the intense fragrance that it sheds about recall again the early spring days of timid flowers and soft green leaves which have later become sadly overheated or dusty beyond recognition. It seeks its home in shady lanes along the coast, where the air is moist, and which is undoubtedly the reason of its freshness so late in the season, and of the vigour of its dark green leaves. It remains in bloom a long time. When bruised the foliage emits a peculiar odour."

Lounsberry, Alice. A Guide to the Wildflowers. New Yor, 1899. 308. Web. Google Book Search. 23 Jul 2009.

Bits of Brown

Sweet Pepperbush is a common find around the lake. I notice that recently the fruiting stalks are breaking over. At first I thought it was localized but I'm seeing this change everywhere I look. I also notice some tiny and slow developing buds.























While walking by the Buttonwood introduced back in December, laying in the sidewalk, right in front of me, was a Buttonwood fruit. Unbelievable! I've been poking around under that tree for months looking for one of these!

















Here it is after dissection.

What Can a Feather Tell?

Once again we are looking at indications of animal activity. Coming upon this caught up feather, I didn't right off notice the broken branch of Sweet Pepperbush.

I wonder if the little bird that left this behind was simply careless? Was this a territorial dispute? Or, was this a hurried escape from a bird of prey?

No other feathers were found in the area so I suppose our little friend did survive the encounter, whatever it may have been.

Mystery Solved!

The Shrub Identification Book by George W. D. Symonds, photographs by A. W. Merwin, to the rescue!

The first half of this book is split into black and white picture keys by thorns, leaves, flowers, fruit, twigs, and bark. Each picture key points to all aspects of the shrub found in the second half, the master pages.

What an incredibly easy system! I quickly narrowed down my mystery seed pods to a few possibilities and after looking closely and reading descriptions of key identifiers, the mystery was solved within minutes.

Sweet Pepperbush, Clethra alnifolia, is a very common shrub found from Maine and down the coastal states to Florida and across to Texas. Appearances can vary as there are a few varieties with pink flowers and another as a more compact bush. My local shrubs all have white flowers--I remember them from last summer.

This struggled identification taught me better observation--important identifiers were that each seed pod was individually attached to a main stalk, that there were five petals, and that there was a persistent and elongated style. I hope this photo helps to illustrate these identifiers.

Here's a Google Books link to this great tool.

For earlier posts regarding the Sweet Pepperbush, see the Index over to the left.

Bits and Pieces

It's leftover night here on the blog. I occasionally need to attend a nearly all day distant meeting that takes up a larger than normal work period. Today was one of those days. Although...I did enjoy the highway driving, taking time to notice various trees and bushes. If I ended up going slower than the general traffic... no one seemed to complain.

A pile of ID books are in and need review later on. But for now, here's another icy shot from a few days ago.




























And now for something completely different, here is an experiment using Photoshop Elements and a sketching technique. This is an early shot of dried flower pods from my famous mystery shrub. I am optimistic that my newly acquired books will put an end to its unknown status.

Mystery Shrub

Today I present my first mystery. I collected this guy last week and figured it'd be any easy ID.

Fruit Key and Twig Key to Trees & Shrubs arrived today and I'm still trying decode this unknown based on illustrated techniques.

Leaf node positioning, bud characteristics, and pith composition should make identification possible. So, if my first attempt is less than a blazing success, it is part of my learning process.

By the way, these photos are shot with my new Canon 50D. Unfortunately the kit lens doesn't do macro very well so these are big time blow ups. Real macro to come maybe next month.