Urbs in Horto

Click on the image for enlarged view ...

A new flower-blog added .. Urbs in Horto ... which is the official motto of the city of Chicago meaning, "city in a garden" ...

Past few days I've been working late nights till literally my shoulders were stiff and my back hurted, just to organize the flower shots I had taken ... and have now uploaded more than 100 images ... of which the name of a few [about 8] flowers I could not find out ... All shots have been taken this year, since April, 2007; when the flowering season begins ...

I've always loved flowers, but having grown in tropical climate, in India ... I was accustomed to very different types of plants ... Here winter is gray and barren, mostly snow covered, there winter was the most colorful season. Many types of common flowers from bulbs, like crocus, hyacinths, alliums, tulips, daffodils ... that require cool winter period, and bloom in spring ... are commonplace here ... but were rare in the place where I grew ... Most flowers like pansy, gladiolous and chrysanthamum that grow in summer here, used to grow in winter there ...

Then Illinois being a prairie land, has it's own set of native plants, that I had never even heard of. Many of the flowers common here as Columbines, Prairie Smoke, Shooting Star, Blazing Star, Compass flower were totally new to me ...

But I love photography, and took lots of photos, especially of flowers that I was not used to ... and then spent hours trying to figure out their names ...

But then the images were all on my computer harddrive and noone else could see them apart from me ... and I thought about uploading it in a blog, so that anyone who likes flowers could enjoy them ... Here's my new blog "Urbs in horto".

Urbs in Horto is the city of Chicago's Latin motto... which is means "City in a Garden" ... It is found on the "Seal" of Chicago, which was enacted in 1833, when the city was still a town. More than 150 years later ... the city has lived up to to it's motto ... and there are gardens and roadside planters & trees all over the town.

The photos have been taken from a number of gardens and includes roadside blooms as well. Some places I go very frequently like Lurie Garden or Lincoln Park Conservatory ... But few places I've visited just once like Gardfield Park and Chicago Botanic Garden ...

Generally images are from:
- Lurie Garden
- Lincoln Park Conservatory
- Chicago Botanic Garden
- Garfield Park
AND lots of roadside bloom ...

I have many more images to add, which I will when i get time ...
Few flowers on my wish list to photograph
- Passion flower
- Birds of paradise

Wish to be there ...
- Morton arboretum ...