Magnolia in bloom

It’s just over two weeks since I took this photograph of the Campbell’s magnolia near the white house. I missed the opening of the first blooms – I must have been sleep-walking as I passed this by every day. Anyway, I finally woke up and noticed it the other day, covered in flowers; some past their best, some yet to open but the tree was looking great in the sunshine.

It’s the only Campbell’s magnolia in the park but I have noticed other bushes that look very much like magnolia judging by the flower buds.

Lots of flowers fully opened in the lower branches with still lots more to open at the top of the tree. Campbell’s magnolia likes a sheltered position and doesn’t like frost, maybe that’s why the more exposed buds are last to open.

You can see that some of the flowers are already turning brown around the edges but mostly the tree is a full of glorious colour. The flowers are just too high to get a good close-up of the inside of one of the flowers.

Another magnolia?

This bush is down by the bowling green and looks like it’s going to be in bloom soon. Will it turn out to be a magnolia?

Well I decided to put down the phone camera and dig out my Nikon D40 and 300mm lens. It may not be the bees knees of DSLR cameras and it’s some years since I have used it but I was pleasantly surprised that the batteries charged up ok and I remembered how to use it. The whole point was to be able to photograph the magnolia flowers more comfortably than I could with my phone and here are the results . .