Charlie Fineran’s picture of the week catches the beauty of a common Warren County plant

An evergreen tree or shrub, the rhododendron is truly a magnificent beauty in all seasons! This is a plant that I have learned to truly appreciate from many different perspectives! Rhododendron, over my years of hiking and photography, have earned it the honors of ‘My Favorite Plant.’ 

The following observations will give you a pretty good insight into my thoughts:  The rhody’s beauty cannot be attributed to just one simple perspective!  Are we talking about the individual, subtle white, pink, or purple flowers, set amid that dark waxy sea of green? That sea of green that creates dark shadows, periodically broken by bursts of sun rays, giving the onlooker that feeling of being in an art museum with the special effects lighting? Is it a beauty of grand proportions, a beauty of a dark shiny green oasis amid a mountainside otherwise devoid of color?!  Imagine that same scenario, but, cover the area with a bright white blanket of snow, creating a magnificent contrast of not only white and greens, but bright and dark!

These photos are all taken in the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area and I hope they visually display what I have tried to describe:

I have provided another link my Flickr account showing my visit through The Rhododendron Species Botanical Garden near Tacoma, Washington.

Nothing can do nature’s beauty justice as a personal visit!

Enjoy Your Open Space

Charlie Fineran
Director Open Space
Allamuchy Township Environmental Commission – Chairman
Allamuchy Historical Society – President