Janet Zeh Art Blog - paintings of birds, flowers, seascapes and country landscapes.
Today I took a walk on the wild side - at the nature preserve to be precise. It was a perfect day, cool, breezy and sunny. I stopped by the water to take in the beauty of waterlilies decorating the pond when a little red dragonfly buzzed past. He's a perfect addition to this painting.
What a color! The waters around Bermuda's South Shore never cease to amaze me. In this painting you see some of the local vegetation in the foreground, the pink coral sand and a coral outcrop in the water. The south shore has many of these outcrops, some very close to shore and standing in groups. But this one makes a singular statement standing alone in the midst of that beautiful blue.
I love these stately and bright flowers and now is the time you'll find them blooming here. I was not aware how many types there are until I was given a lecture on sunflowers by a client at one of my outdoor art shows. The people who visit my booth sometimes know more than I do about what I've painted. I learn a lot! 
I love to see the hummingbirds visit my garden. Since I don't have time for all that a hummingbird feeder entails, what with keeping it cleaned and the food changed every few days, I try to grow flowers which will attract them. It works. At least one will zoom around the garden almost every day all summer long. Anytime there is more than one, though, they are chasing each other. Hummingbirds are very territorial, and no wonder. It takes a tremendous amount of energy to hover the way they do and a lot of territory to get the food they need.
Whenever I show my work at an outdoor festival these days, people tell me about their morning glories. That's because I always have a painting or two of these extremely popular flowers. Theirs are either doing spectacularly this year or not blooming at all. I keep hearing the same extremes and am not sure what the reason is for the difference. Everyone is getting the same amount of rain (lots), and sun. It's kind of funny.
My Rugosa Roses are blooming still. I love the way they keep coming back all summer long. Even now, while they are loaded with bright orange rose hips - the seed heads - the flowers keep blooming. The butterflies, bees and hummingbirds are happy too. Here are three which have just opened up in my garden.
Pansies are a riot of color in a spring garden. I think this painting captures their bright nodding heads! 
I found this gorgeous hibiscus in Mystic, Connecticut, a quaint seaside town where the art festival I participated in was held this past weekend. The flowers blooming in the small gardens there were outstanding. With all the sunshine and rain we've had this summer along with the mild winter the flowers are loving it! 
These members of the warbler family inhabit second growth forests where there are plenty of saplings. They have a habit of swiftly flapping their wings to flush out insects from the undergrowth. The male is black with bright orange-red patches on wings and tail. The female is also pretty with bright yellow patches. They winter to the Gulf coast in the US.
Yesterday, this beautiful dark Swallowtail butterfly flitted and sailed around my hydrangea bushes landing here and there with slow wingbeats to sip nectar from the many flowers. I thought it would make a stunning painting because of the contrast between the while blossoms and the black butterfly.
A friend of mine who lives in Texas would occasionally send me photos he'd taken of these birds on South Padre Island's nature preserve - the same South Padre Island that just endured the hurricane last month. In the winter and early spring, Roseate Spoonbills flock to the island's coastal marshes and lagoons along with many other sea birds.
Here is a close-up of hydrangea blossoms that bloom now in my garden. I have four shrubs that grow each year to 7-8 feet tall whether I cut them back to the ground in spring or not. They are magnificent as a tall hedge and attract an incredible variety of bees and wasps. The insects almost seem to get high on the nectar by the way they frantically go after it. Luckily, I'm not afraid of bees or wasps, more fascinated by them. They are so involved with the flowers that they pay no attention to me. No bees or wasps in this painting, though.
The sun is glowing through the petals of this white flower. Beautiful!
It's hot and humid. My army son says he brought the Georgia weather home - huge downpours every few hours and 7,000% humidity (according to him). A walk along a Bermuda beach sounds like a lovely idea - watching the sun sparkle on turquoise waters, huge coral outcrops framing the scene, cool pink sand beneath your toes. Ahh.
Red-winged blackbirds mean summertime to me. In the Nature Preserve where I like to walk, there are several ponds. The first is full of these blackbirds during the warmer months singing their liquid song. I've painted one of them clinging to a cattail in front of the pond a-bloom with water lilies. 
