I Love Milkweed

I'm getting back to nature today with a few pictures of the flowers of a milkweed plant. This particular kind of milkweed is, I believe, swamp milkweed. As far as I remember, you can kind of tell by the color of the flowers.

I have to tell you, I really love milkweed plants. Maybe they're my favorite plant in existence. It's partly because of these wonderful little flowers, but it's mainly because of the pods they grow after awhile. I knew about the pods before any other part of the plant.

These plants don't have the pods yet. But they look like little alien pods from Invasion Of The Body Snatchers. All that's really in the pods though are seeds with a cottony section that helps the seeds fly so they can be distributed all around the area. That part is fun.

Then later after I began this blog, I learned about the flowers of these plants. I thought the pods looked like something alien, but take a good close look at these flowers. They look almost like they have alien-like mandibles or something.

That feature is something a science fiction lover like me can really get into. These supposed claws are actually soft, so there's nothing to really worry about. And you only really see them with a good up close look. But it enhances the alien theme of the pods even more. Don't you think?
  

I usually say when I have pictures of flowers that I don't know a thing about plants. But milkweed is kind of an exception. I was able to learn quite a bit about milkweed a few years ago. I wrote several posts about it that are still some of my favorites.

Because of my car accident from a couple of years ago, I've forgotten much of what I learned about milkweed, but I still remember quite a bit. The pods on each kind look a little different. Some are smooth, and some look kind of spiky. They're all shaped kind of like jalapeno peppers, but their surfaces are rough.

I don't want to get too much into describing everything, but that little bit is okay I guess. You can see that I can go on and on with milkweed. It makes me feel like I used to when writing a post. Maybe some of that will spill into my future posts. Anyway, I'll talk to you later.

The Missouri River At The Dam

I got a chance to look out over the Missouri River on both sides of the dam. I have a few good pictures of the side before the dam. I was glad there were a few places where I could pull over and look around.

I don't know if the formations in the top picture are natural or if they were cut into the side of the hills when the dam was built. I suspect the latter. They're not exactly cliffs, at least I don't think, because it's not made of rock, it's dirt.

This second picture shows a hint of just how big the Missouri River is at this location. It's a lot bigger than I thought it was. Not quite as big as the Detroit River, but I can compare the two favorably.

I took this last picture while the truck was moving across the dam so it was a little clumsy. Still not bad though. I wish I could have missed the railing, but that's the breaks. At least I didn't run off the road.

My next trip will be to some place where I can get a little bit back to nature. I haven't been able to test out my camera in my usual type of place yet, so that's where I'm going. Besides, it's going to be nice to go to a place where I can be alone. All the people around get tiresome sometimes.

I still have more pictures to share from this location, but I'm pretty much dome with the dam and the water. I'll mix those posts in with posts from newer trips. I'll see how it goes each time. I said before I'd have too many pictures. Now I don't know what to do with them. Oh well. Talk to you next time.