#bluebells
Bluebelltime!!Yes!Yes!~Charlotte-AnneFidler
Campanula rotundifolia “Mountain Harebell” Campanulaceae
Two Medicine, Glacier National Park, MT
October 8, 2015
Robert Niese
The Mountain Harebell has a circumpolar distribution where it tends to be a late-blooming perennial. As a native of the British Isles, the harebell has attracted the attention of many a great English poet, including William Shakespeare, John Clare, and Christina Rossetti. Here in the PNW, the Haida people called them “blue rain flowers” and believed that picking them would cause it to rain.
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Blue and violet wildflowers in-bloom in the first week of June
(from top-to-bottom, left-to-right: Penstemonsp.,Mertensia longiflora,Delphinium bicolor,Lupinus sericeus,Viola adunca,Linum lewisii,Mertensia paniculata)
Lolo National Forest, MT
June 2014, 2015, 2016
Robert Niese
I finally have an instagram with loads of not-so-sciencey nature and personal content! Feel free to drop by and peak into the life of a nerdy natural historian! www.instagram.com/robertniese/
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i wood live here
The Isochronus Stag was nowhere to be seen. All that remained were the jewel-like butterflies that had surrounded him, drifting in and out of the pale shards of light. On the other side of the tunnel that they had entered, Quinn and Horatia could hear a cacophony of voices and the sound of grinding metal - a rescue team had arrived for them. Wanting to keep the lost gardens and their experiences a secret, Queen Horatia and Quinn raced into the tunnel to greet the rescue team before they could venture any further.
With Queen Horatia safely back above ground, Isochronus bloomed with bluebells, a sight that had not been seen for many years. The trees in the felled forest started to grow back, engulfing and then swallowing the marble statue of the Isochronus Stag into the ground. In the process, the entrance to the lost gardens was sealed off forever. As Isochronus flourished, the affected Isochrons’ eyesight started to return.
A two weeklong celebration was held for Queen Horatia’s safe return. As part of the festivities, Queen Horatia granted a royal pardon to the Navigator after a mysterious green glass bottle had been found on the shores of Isochronus with a letter detailing their trials and tribulations. Returning to their homeland, the Navigator and her crew were received with delight and fanfare as they regaled the Queen and her citizens with tales of their adventures and new home.
Whilst there were scattered reports and theories of his whereabouts and even unverified reports on the return of Isochronus deer, sadly, the Isochronus Stag was never seen again. Perhaps he was no longer needed or perhaps the balance had already tipped too far – sometimes even when you fix a problem, you still can’t go back to how things were.
On the final morning of the celebrations, Quinn could feel that it was time for him to go. Not one to make a fuss, he quietly slipped away from the palace to wait for the portal to appear. Outside the gate, which was entwined with ginormous coral roses, the familiar light appeared again, warm and comforting, like the heat of the morning sun on a summer’s day. Smiling to himself as he thought back on everything he had experienced over the past year, Quinn walked towards to portal.
“Goodbye, Quinn”, he heard, just as he reached the threshold.
Standing behind him, all dressed in their finest attire, Queen Horatia, Prince Cassius, the Navigator and the Gardener had come to wave him off. In his own silent and resolutely unwavering way, Quinn had helped each one of them navigate through the very worst of their ordeals. Giving them one last beaming smile, Quinn walked into the portal with his tail waving from side to side, glad in the knowledge that he was leaving Isochronus, and his friends, in a better place than when he had arrived.
With that, the portal closed. A deafening silence filled the air for a few seconds before the sound of birdsong returned.
“I wonder if we’ll see him again” Horatia smiled, as she gently placed her hands on her stomach.
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And that’s a wrap! Can you believe it? 9 pins, over 50 illustrations, 20 Gif stickers, 8 phone backgrounds and 10,000 words written, Quinn the Fox’s year long adventures in Isochronus are finally coming to an end. Today is the final day to get your hands on our last set of pins before we wrap up #TheLostGardensOfIsochronus for good. Make sure you head on over to our online shop (shop.andyhau.com) to get these 2 limited edition pins now!
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A light breeze pushed Queen Horatia’s hair away from her face as she entered the cave and as their eyes started to adjust to the light, it revealed a phantasmagorical technicolour garden, as though a prism had refracted every shard of light within the cave. Overgrown with bluebells so lush and plump, they bowed their heads, as though in genuflection for the arrival of their two new guests. On the top of a hill, lit by rays of light and resplendently surrounded by butterflies, stood the Isochronus Stag, regaled in a short auburn coat and crowned with two magnificent vine-like antlers on the top of his handsome head.
Leaving Horatia by the entrance, Quinn slowly approached the Stag and stopped a short distance in front of him. Looking towards the ground, Quinn solemnly bowed his head. As she tried to see what was happening, Queen Horatia’s realised her eyesight was slowly returning - the instigator of all her hardships throughout the past year was now standing in front of her.
Inching carefully closer towards the Stag, Queen Horatia squinted her eyes and inspected him carefully. Standing almost three times as tall as Quinn, the Stag’s short but dense coat glistened like a mirror. As the butterflies flapped around her, Horatia took a deep breath, and following Quinn’s lead, she dipped her head, which the Stag returned. Slowly but surely, she stretched out her arm to touch the Stag’s neck and as her hand made contact, the Stag imparted a vision:
After the cataclysmic natural disaster, the paradise gardens from the legend had become entombed underground. Whilst many of the plants from the garden couldn’t survive in such conditions, undisturbed by humanity, the gardens started to develop its own ecosystem. Of the species that developed during this time, the Isochronus deer thrived in such an environment, keeping the gardens maintained through their constant grazing. But nature can be cruel and the success of this species led to overpopulation and fairly soon, the gardens couldn’t sustain the deer anymore. It was around this time that Queen Horatia’s ancestors founded Isochronus and through their desire to irrigate the soil to bring life back to the wasteland, a tunnel was accidentally created for the deer to escape.
The Isochrons and the deer lived happily together for many years but as Isochronus advanced, more and more of the deer’s habitat became overtaken. Finally one day, they all but vanished.
A quiet epiphany washed over Queen Horatia. Throughout the course of the year and the tribulations that she had faced, she had learnt that life isn’t about grand gestures or overblown displays of altruism or an unrelenting need for control. This was her final lesson: humility. The balance between nature and mankind is, and will always be, tenuous and uneasy. Both can be as unimaginably destructive and cruel as the other, yet both have the ability to create an inordinate amount of beauty and good, particularly when they work in synergy. In this moment, she realised, whilst mankind may have contributed to the destruction of nature, it is also the only force born of nature capable of resisting its entropy for the benefit of all living things.
Standing among the swaying bluebell, Queen Horatia’s full vision returned.
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The final set of limited edition pins for Quinn’s adventures in Isochronus are now available from our online shop (shop.andyhau.com). For the last year, Quinn’s adventures in Isochronus have taken him across oceans, to the top of the highest mountains and now to the deepest of chasms. As Quinn’s Odyssey comes to an end, the final form of the Isochronus Stag is revealed! I want to thank everyone who has joined us for this journey - 9 pins, almost 50 illustrations and 10,000 words written in total, I hope you’ve all enjoyed “The Lost Gardens Of Isochronus”! As usual, these 2 pins are only available for 2 weeks and then they’ll disappear from the shop so make sure you grab one before they go!
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Deeper and deeper they fell into the chasm until finally they saw the bottom of the sinkhole. From a distance, the ground looked like it was covered in a deep cobalt coloured carpet, which was so intensely pigmented that it appeared to glow. Seeing the ground quickly approach, Quinn and Horatia looked at one another one last time before closing their eyes to brace themselves for impact.
As they hit the ground at full velocity, to their surprise, Quinn and Horatia felt as though they had been absorbed by a giant, fluffy pillow. Gradually opening his eyes, Quinn blinked in awe as he saw that they had landed in a beautiful field of glowing bluebells, which had helped to cushion their fall. It is often said that bluebells are an indicator of a healthy ancient forest, yet deep underground, in this cavernous landscape and without even a trace of sunlight, it was hard for Quinn to understand how these flowers had started to grow here.
Perhaps due to shock, Queen Horatia’s eyesight started to deteriorate even more rapidly than before. Even though her field of vision was becoming more and more restricted, she could smell the strong sweet perfume of bluebells in the cold, damp air, a smell so powerful that it triggered memories from her childhood, a time when bluebells still grew in Isochronus.
Noticing her struggling, Quinn walked towards Queen Horatia and stretched out his paw to help her get back onto her feet. As they surveyed their new surroundings, they wondered to themselves how they would ever survive their predicament.
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Deeper and deeper they fell into the chasm until finally they saw the bottom of the sinkhole. From a distance, the ground looked like it was covered in a deep cobalt coloured carpet, which was so intensely pigmented that it appeared to glow. Seeing the ground quickly approach, Quinn and Horatia looked at one another one last time before closing their eyes to brace themselves for impact.
As they hit the ground at full velocity, to their surprise, Quinn and Horatia felt as though they had been absorbed by a giant, fluffy pillow. Gradually opening his eyes, Quinn blinked in awe as he saw that they had landed in a beautiful field of glowing bluebells, which had helped to cushion their fall. It is often said that bluebells are an indicator of a healthy ancient forest, yet deep underground, in this cavernous landscape and without even a trace of sunlight, it was hard for Quinn to understand how these flowers had started to grow here.
Perhaps due to shock, Queen Horatia’s eyesight started to deteriorate even more rapidly than before. Even though her field of vision was becoming more and more restricted, she could smell the strong sweet perfume of bluebells in the cold, damp air, a smell so powerful that it triggered memories from her childhood, a time when bluebells still grew in Isochronus.
Noticing her struggling, Quinn walked towards Queen Horatia and stretched out his paw to help her get back onto her feet. As they surveyed their new surroundings, they wondered to themselves how they would ever survive their predicament.
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Early purple orchid surrounded by bluebells #orchids #orchid #bluebells #wildflowers #flowers
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Turn the sound up for this one! This is the interior of the Brands Hatch Grand Prix circuit. In front of me, a beautiful broadleaf woodland carpeted with bluebells. Just behind me, Audis , Mercedes and Lamborghinis are taking part in the #blancpaingt race series. I grew up close to this track and on a sunny spring day it really cannot be beaten. #brandshatch #woodland #wildflowers #trees #bluebells #flowers #motorsport #gt
Some pink bluebells opposite my house. This would suggest that these are Spanish Bluebells (Hyacinthoides hispanica) rather than English (Hyacinthoides non-scripta) as there is no known pink English bluebells. The English bluebells are prized and smell divine, but I do still love these Spanish bluebells.
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I saw some white bluebells this morning in the graveyard. They’re very rare; according to the National Trust, “It is estimated that the proportion of blue to white flowered bluebells is 10,000 : 1″. Like their blue counterparts, they’re strongly associated with fairies, innocence, and truth. It’s said that when the sun begins to rise they tinkle to summon the fairies home, and misfortune would fall on any human who heard it.
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![Aubrey [Abroad]](https://64.media.tumblr.com/avatar_8a9e68eb3c8c_30.png){kind=avatar}
The bluebell woods after sunset
Twilight in the wild wood: the bluebell and the white
Woodland ride: horse and rider in the distance
Bluebells in the field
Woodland light and shade
Dawn chorus, in the bluebell wood twilight before the sun came up. Sound on.
The faerie kingdoms of the old bluebell woods II: May Eve
Bluebells and stitchwort
The enchanted wood
