ARCHIVAL

Dipping into the archives and reconstructing the current season.

This post is part of the Mosaic Monday meme, 
and also part of the Seasons meme.

SUNSET REFLECTIONS

The sunset is reflected on the façade of the ANZ headquarters in South Wharf in Melbourne.

This post is part of the Skywatch Friday meme

PRECIOUS BLUE

Semiprecious stones dazzle with their colour, but beware! All that shines is not gold. Upper left is a howlite-turquenite, which is a howlite (normaly creamy white), dyed blue to become a blue turquenite. In the middle, a labradorite, which looks much better than it really is, and finally, in the lower right lapis lazuli: The source of the precious artists' pigment, ultramarine... But a soft stone, nevertheless, which makes for jewellery easily scratched.

This post is part of the Mosaic Monday meme,
and also part of the Blue Monday meme,
and also part of the Seasons meme.

TREE TRUNK

A tree growing on a bluff, exposed to the rough weather grows gnarled and wizened, but strong...

This post is part of the Wordless Wednesday meme,

and also part of the My Corner of the World meme,

and also part of the Nature Notes meme.

APARTMENT BLOCK

The more apartment blocks they build, the more like prison complexes they look...

This post is part of the My Sunday Best meme

OF WOOD & STONE

This post is part of the Mosaic Monday meme,

and also part of the Blue Monday meme,

and also part of the Seasons meme.

TIMBER!

This post is part of the My Sunday Best meme.

HELLO AUTUMN

Our trees are showing beautiful Autumn colours and the weather has been wet, cool and crisp. Read the sign...

This post is part of the Mosaic Monday meme,
and also part of the Macro Monday meme,
and also part of the Through my Lens meme,
and also part of the Seasons meme.

MELBOURNE WEEDS 15 - HEMLOCK

Conium maculatum, the hemlock or poison hemlock, is a highly poisonous biennial herbaceous flowering plant in the carrot family Apiaceae, native to Europe and North Africa. A hardy plant capable of living in a variety of environments, hemlock is widely naturalised in locations outside its native range.

Conium maculatum is known by several common names. In addition to the English hemlock, the Australian carrot fern and the Irish devil's bread or devil's porridge, the following names are also used: Poison parsley, spotted corobane and spotted hemlock. The dried stems are sometimes called kecksies or kex. Conium comes from the Ancient Greek κώνειον - kṓneion: "hemlock". This may be related to konas (meaning to whirl), in reference to vertigo, one of the symptoms of ingesting the plant.

Hemlock is a herbaceous biennial flowering plant that grows to 1.5–2.5 m  tall, with a smooth, green, hollow stem, usually spotted or streaked with red or purple on the lower half of the stem. All parts of the plant are hairless (glabrous); the leaves are two- to four-pinnate, finely divided and lacy, overall triangular in shape, up to 50 cm long and 40 cm broad. It has been introduced and naturalised in many other areas, including Asia, North America, Australia and New Zealand. The plant is often found in poorly drained soil, particularly near streams, ditches and other watery surfaces. It also appears on roadsides, edges of cultivated fields and waste areas and is considered an invasive species in 12 U.S. states. Poison hemlock flourishes in the spring, when most other forage is gone. All plant parts are poisonous, but once the plant is dried, the poison is greatly reduced, although not gone completely.

Conium maculatum is the plant that killed Theramenes, Socrates and Phocion. In ancient Greece, hemlock was used to poison condemned prisoners. Socrates, the most famous victim of hemlock poisoning, was accused of impiety and corrupting the young men of Athens in 399 BC, and his trial resulted in a death sentence. Although Socrates could have avoided death, he decided to take a potent infusion of the hemlock plant.

DO NOT PICK OR EAT THIS PLANT, IT IS QUITE TOXIC AND COULD CAUSE DEATH!

This post is part of the Floral Friday Fotos meme.

COBURG LAKE

Coburg Lake Reserve is a popular district level park in Melbourne's Northern suburbs, offering a great variety of activities including picnicking, playgrounds, barbecue facilities, walking and bike paths and nature play all set in a beautiful heritage setting overlooking Coburg Lake.

Several playgrounds are located throughout the park. These are nestled amongst the gardens and next to the lake. If you like to watch wildlife you will love the Coburg Lake Reserve. Ducks, swans and native birds can be observed here.

This post is part of the Outdoor Wednesday meme,
and also part of the Wordless Wednesday meme.

W-CLASS TRAM, MELBOURNE

The W-class design tram, first introduced in 1923, was an outstanding success, and has been the mainstay of the Melbourne tram system for the bulk of the 20th century. It is a two-bogie, drop-centre design, which has had many variants over the years. The oldest W-class tram still in active service was built in 1938. Originally, W-class was the term given to those trams built before the W1 was introduced, but now the name refers to all the variants as a group. Some of the trams are denoted SW (for sliding doors).

The tram is on La Trobe St, going past The RMIT University buildings, which include the grand old corner edifice, the Old Magistrate's Court. It was opened on 20 January 1914, and served the City for 81 years, before a new Magistrates' Court building was opened on William Street in 1995. Notable trails conducted at the court include that of Ned Kelly, Squizzy Taylor, and members of the Eureka Stockade. The court stands at the corner of La Trobe and Russell Sts.

This post is part of the Friday Greens meme,
and also part of the Skywatch Friday meme.

CONVENTION CENTRE REFLECTIONS

The Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre is the name given to two adjacent buildings next to the Yarra River in South Wharf, an inner-city suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Owner and manager of the venues is the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Trust.

The new Convention Centre, on land adjacent to the Exhibition Centre, was completed in 2009. At a cost of A$1 billion, the development consists of a 5541 seat Plenary Hall that can be divided into three separate theatres, 32 meeting rooms of various sizes, a grand banquet room as well as a Hilton hotel, office, residential and retail space.

Polly Woodside is a Belfast-built, three-masted, iron-hulled barque, preserved in Melbourne, Australia, and forming the central feature of the South Wharf precinct. The ship was originally built in Belfast by William J. Woodside and was launched in 1885. Polly Woodside is typical of thousands of smaller iron barques built in the last days of sail, intended for deep water trade around the world and designed to be operated as economically as possible.

This post is part of the Weekend Reflections meme,
and also part of the Weekly TopShot meme.