The overarching theme in our two-year project is Community.  So far we’ve created quilts from the prompts Identity, Reflection and International.  Regina Marzlin gave us the fourth prompt—Ecosystems.  But then she goes on to explain:

For our next challenge I would like you to think about biological communities, that is: communities of animal and/or plant life. These are not really ecosystems as those consist also of the inorganic components of the environment. “Ecosystems” is just a catchier title for our challenge. A biological community is just the living members of an ecosystem, that is animals and plants, living together in some way.

As soon as I read the prompt, I immediately thought of one plant. In the Mediterranean climate I call home, one of the characteristics is that we get most of our precipitation in the winter.  Summers are hot and dry.  They’re harsh, and any sensible plant would make some sort of accommodation to survive—say, going dormant in the summer.  Doesn’t that make more sense than going dormant when there’s lots of water around?

For that reason I’m basing my next piece on a native plant that has adapted well to its environment: the California buckeye, Aesculus californica. It is one of the first deciduous trees to leaf out in my area. It’s usually late February or early March.  I just love to see the bright green leaves in the winter. 

It blooms around May, and this is my least favorite time for this tree.  I don’t like the flowers and neither do the bees. 

After flowering, the tree sets fruit and starts turning brown.  Think of it like fall.  Most deciduous trees lose their leaves in the fall in preparation for hibernating in winter.  Well, this tree goes dormant in the summer.  Wouldn’t you like to go dormant in 100° (38° C) heat?

From late summer to late winter, you can admire the bushy structure of the tree. The leaves are either dried and shriveled or have fallen off, as in the image below.

For my art quilt for this round, I’ve already completed my digital painting, but I can’t show it to you until the end of January. Once again I’m having it printed on the luscious Silk Crinkle Linen from MyFabricDesigns.com. I used that fabric for my last piece, too.  You can see photos of that one here. Please stop by this blog again at the end of January to see all twelve of our biodiversity-inspired pieces and what my version of a California buckeye looks like.

Thank you to Neal Kramer for permission to use his California buckeye photos in this post.