Around town

The other day I spent a little time on Main Street with my camera, noticing plantings that have sprung up lately. Outside the police-fire dispatch center is a bed of purple daisy-like echinacea and something else, possibly milkweed. Milkweed used to be a common roadside weed that emits a sticky white fluid when a stem is broken.
The flowers, which range from whitish to purpleish, have a surprisingly strong aroma which is generally lost to us in the wide open spaces, but not if you find a milkweed palnt in a smaller, somewhat enclosed space.

The seeds form in large pods and have silky white sails attached that carry them on the wind after the pod bursts. Milkweed is home to the Monarch butterfly.

Milkweed does not seem as common as it once did, perhaps because in this state, at least, the road crews determinedly mow down all roadside growth, perhaps in the interests of visibility.

The Windham Garden Club has been sprucing up various sites around town with the addition of attractive window boxes and tubs of flowers. It's a good undertaking, that increases the comfort level downtown. This photo shows a tub of mixed plants tucked in an alley way.

Two more photos