ATC, Nature Journal and a figure

I finished another ATC card, The flower is a cosmos which I photographed last summer. Done on 140lb cold press watercolor paper, I outlined the flower with ink and then used watercolor to fill in.

Below is a Nature Journal page from my visit to Moose Hill MA Audubon Sanctuary in Sharon, MA. last week.

This isn't a sanctuary I visit very often which is a bit odd since it is closer to me than many of the others I more frequently visit. But this site is mainly woods and fields including a working farm with not a lot of open water, it is water I seem to be attracted to and is the main feature of the sites I visit most often.

The top image  in the journal is of a Sugar Maple tree next to a stone wall. This tree has been tapped to collect sap. Later the sanctuary will have a public Sugar Off day to boil the sap down to either maple syrup or sugar. I did walk by the shed where they have cords of wood stacked waiting for the event.

The lower image is of a wisteria seed pod. One of the trees in the sanctuary is the prop for an old wisteria vine. I have seen this in bloom in past years and it is really quite beautiful. Probably not very good for the tree in the long term but so far both seem to be doing well. The pods aren't very long about 4 inches and are fuzzy on the outside.

Above is last nights figure drawing. It was an interesting pose though the model found it difficult to hold, so I wasn't able to get some of the elements as well defined as I would have liked. Namely the hand that is reaching down onto her leg. Still I think it works. We rarely have a pose where the model is leaning forward like she was last night, so it was sort of fun to draw.

My last image is a photograph I made at Moose Hill. The shed behind the trees is really for a colony of bats to have a home, though I am sure they use the shed for storage of other items used on the property. The 2 trees in the center of the photo are Sugar Maples as you can tell by the buckets attached to the trees to collect sap. These are huge trees, I have to wonder just how old they are, but the member who was at the center when I returned didn't know when I asked her. I would guess about 300 200 years, but of course I may be wrong. Still this land has been farmed for probably at least that long so it is possible. Sugar Maples would have been highly prized by the farmer who owned the land, and might even have been planted.

That is it for today, per usual comments are welcome.