Scarlet pea flowers
From Pflugerville on April 5th come these scarlet pea flowers, Indigofera miniata.
© 2026 Steven Schwartzman
Green lacewing on spotted mushroom
On April 16th we went to check out Canyon Lake Gorge in Comal County. Hiking through the gorge itself requires making reservations for a guided tour at least a day in advance, which we hadn’t done, so we set out to walk the gorge overlook trail instead. Barely had we begun walking when we encountered scattered mushrooms of the type shown below, individually and in small groups. They might have been Coprinopsis picacea, known as magpie mushroom, magpie fungus, or magpie inkcap. Eve called my attention to what was on one of the mushrooms: the green lacewing shown above.
© 2026 Steven Schwartzman
One animate and one inanimate thing on a rain lily leaf
On April 14th I photographed a spider clinging to a rain lily leaf. Three days earlier, also in
my part of town, the subject had been a raindrop that later reminded me of a little planet.
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The letters in the English word NOW can be rearranged to make two other real words, OWN and WON. The letters in TEA go it one better, as they can be rearranged to make ATE, EAT, and ETA (the name of a letter in the Greek alphabet).
Three different letters can be arranged in six ways: ABC, ACB, BAC, BCA, CAB, CBA. In theory there could be three English letters that make six real words, or if not six, then five. So far I haven’t found more than four, as in the example of TEA, ATE, EAT, and ETA. Can you find three letters that are arrangeable to make five or six real English words?
© 2026 Steven Schwartzman
Earth Day 2026
For this year’s Earth Day, here are two kinds of round fungi I found growing very close to the earth in Austin’s Schroeter Park on April 14th. One fungus was off-white and looked from above like a warty sphere.
The other fungus, which was growing out of the earth adjacent to a dead branch on the ground, at first reminded me of a small donut until the view from below disabused me of that impression.
© 2026 Steven Schwartzman
Spirally striped land snails
In Pflugerville on April 5th I found some spirally striped land snails on dry leaves. Here are two of them.
© 2026 Steven Schwartzman
Two heads are better than none
On April 13th in Great Hills Park I noticed a Mexican hat (Ratibida columnifera) that was developing two central columns joined at the base, rather than the single column that’s normal for the species. I also found an unusual specimen that lacked a central column. Whether that’s the strange way it was developing, or whether an animal or person had broken off the central column, I don’t know.
© 2026 Steven Schwartzman
Appearances sometimes deceive
April 11th found me still photographically binging on rain lilies (Zephyranthes sp.). You probably assume from this picture that the dark little insect had had it, that it was a goner, that it was done for, that its goose was cooked, because the much larger crab spider already had two legs over the insect. When I’d begun observing the spider, I noticed the insect quite a bit further down, and eventually it walked up to the position you see here. The spider and insect tussled for maybe one second and then the insect walked off unharmed. The spider didn’t pursue it.
© 2026 Steven Schwartzman
White land snails
Many little land snails of various kinds and colors make their home in the Austin area. The white one above had wedged itself between two pads of a prickly pear cactus (Opuntia engelmannii var. lindheimeri) in Pflugerville on April 6th, and two days later on the same property I found a differently shaped white snail on the dry remains of a queen’s delight plant (Stillingia texana).
© 2026 Steven Schwartzman
Novel rain lily views
I’ve taken hundreds and hundreds, maybe thousands, of rain lily (Zephyranthes sp.) pictures over the past quarter-century. These two close abstractions from Pflugerville on April 8th don’t look like any rain lily portraits I’d previously made, nor like those I’ve seen anyone else make. Hail, novelty!
© 2026 Steven Schwartzman
First prickly pear cactus flowers of the year
Coming back from errands on April 13th, I saw my first prickly pear cactus flowers (Opuntia engelmannii var. lindheimeri) for 2026 along Floral Park Dr. in our Great Hills neighborhood. After unloading groceries, back out I went with my camera to record the new flowers. Drops from rain the previous night or that morning clung to the outside of some of the flowers, forming rings visible through the translucent petals.
© 2026 Steven Schwartzman
Portraits of Wildflowers 