Two weeks ago tomorrow, the first two blossoms on one of our Siberian bugloss (Brunnera macrophylla) appeared and I made this image. I had intended to post it before now, but things have been reeeeally busy.
Yesterday was an absolutely gorgeous, practically windless day, and I took time off from other commitments and spent several hours outside with my camera, communing with a number of attractive subjects, as you will see, all in good time. Among these were the Brunnera again, which have produced hundreds of blossoms in the meantime.
They grow on very slender stalks that are practically in constant motion if there is any movement of air, so a calm day is essential for photography.
By the way, they do come from eastern Siberia, and their name—as I have written before (here)—is interesting. It has nothing to do with bugs or loss, but rather comes from the Greek bous, a cow’s or bull’s head, and glossa, tongue—and it’s so named because the person who named it saw a resemblance in the plant’s leaves. The flowers are quite tiny, about a quarter-inch in diameter. We love seeing the Brunnera in bloom!
krikitarts 
The mass of flowers in the middle shot here is beautiful both as a single shape and as a mass of individual entities – the combination of the flowers’ white centres and their pale blue petals is gorgeous. And while the backdrop is generally darkish and unobtrusive, those pale ovoids at lower right set the flowers off wonderfully. A
I considered not including the middle shot in the post, but the more I looked at my final crop and composition, the more I liked it. I’m so glad that you do too, Adrian–thanks!
Very pretty, Gary. I particularly like the second image; the blue colour of those little flowers really stands out.
I have one brunnera plant in the garden – the Jack Frost variegated variety. It grows well – as do forget-me-nots, the flowers of which are more or less identical. I just had to look up both plants on the web to check the plant family. They are both from the borage family as are pulmonarias, and they all do very well on our chalky soil.
I’ve been fond of forget-me-nots for as long as I remember, and I also remember thinking that the Brunnera were identical with them. I was not surprised to learn that they were so closely related–or that you’re a fan of them, too.
Lovely photos.
Hard to capture those tiny blooms in photos. You did well. It almost looks like a Chinese forget-me-not (as opposed to an ordinary forget-me-not).
I just looked them up and you’re right–they are amazingly similar!
So happy things are finally greening-up. We have Pasque flowers blooming, but that is about it so far.
So am i! Hardly anything in northern MN yet, though–but I hear the lake ice finally broke up, so it shouldn’t be long!