Summer Solstice Pictures

[urbpan]

We celebrated Summer Solstice last weekend by taking the dogs into the woods around West Roxbury Quarry.  Since this isn't officially public land, we figured we wouldn't bump into other dogs there.  The sun was celebrating, too, blazing high in the sky; the plants roared with green, devouring the sunshine.  It seemed impossibly lush and overgrown.

The abandoned cars are beginning to disappear into the forest.  A few more decades of rain and they'll be iron-rich spots in the soil.


Does chromium ever decompose--will it oxidize or form other compounds eventually, or will these bumpers be shiny fossils waiting for future paleontologists?






A sassafras sapling has decided to grow in the engine compartment.


Did I mention that the sun was BLAZING?  Up on these old quarried cliffs there was a bit of a breeze.


The dogs still found it almost unbearable.  But relief would come a few pictures later.


Up on the rocks we found flattened beer cans, plastic slag from 'campfires', and an unfamiliar wildflower.  As it turns out, Corydalis sempervirens is a pioneer plant that specializes in recently burned open rocky habitat.  I love that after almost 4 decades of life in New England, there are still new life forms to encounter.


Down a little lower on the rocks, the thick root of a birch shows how plants can grow on bare stone.  Lichen grows on rock and root alike.


The triumph of photosynthesis is complete!  Yellow waterlilies use the surface of a water-filled quarry hole as a platform for their life-building.  Charlie finds the swimming to be rife with entanglements.


On our way out we pass the derelict building we saw last time.  Somehow on the way in, I utterly missed seeing it in the enveloping green.
Click the West Roxbury Quarry link up above to see what it looked like 8 weeks previous.  It seems important to state what may be obvious:  These pictures were all taken in the City of Boston.

Comments

[jolantru.livejournal.com]

Beautiful! :)

[brush-rat.livejournal.com]

Eventually, the chrome surface flakes away and the bumper oxidizes away. Like the commercial and the song says, rust never sleeps.

[buboniclou.livejournal.com]

LOL SCIENCE FAIL
Paleontologists dig up dinos and such ;)

Love the pictures!

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

THEY DO NOW, BUT FOR HOW LONG?

thanks!

[mizdarkgirl.livejournal.com]

Check out this car in West Roxbury. It is even WORSE now!
(If the link doesn't work, "Street View" "38 VFW Pkwy, west roxbury ma" in google and look in the driveway.

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=west+roxbury+ma&ie=UTF8&ll=42.310133,-71.13596&spn=0.02888,0.052872&z=14&layer=c&cbll=42.295671,-71.138892&panoid=BaqtH1_XxD6joqUQokvlEQ&cbp=1,203.83945845333642,,0,3.5714285714285707


Also have you been to Lost Pond?
http://www.newtonconservators.org/19lostpond.htm
You can park on the corner of Arlington and Craftsland and there is a path you can follow thru. Make sure the RT9 side of Arlington not the Transfer Station side. It doesn't connect and there isn't parking on that side unless you park near the new playground. There is some ORANGE water near the playground so that would be bad for the hounds. (Google on 300 Arlington Rd, Chestnut Hill, Norfolk, Massachusetts 02467, United States). I found an almost gone Volkswagon Bug near the Farina Road side of the park.

[bellelvsbeast.livejournal.com]

OOOH I love the picture of Charlie swimming in water lillies! How fun! :)
Those old cars look like giant animal carcasses, with all the skin melted in. BLARG. I see too many carcasses in my line of work...:P