Saturday, 12/27/14

Mushrooms on dead tree.

A fairly soggy day in the Ozarks, not that we actually received all that much rain -- only around three-tenths of an inch.  Jo and the dogs got a little damp this morning.  They got caught by a drizzle while returning home on their morning walk.  Our afternoon walk was a little soggy too.  Don't know if you'd call it a heavy fog or a light drizzle, but you'd get wet if you stayed out in it for a while.

Temperature fell slowly all day, but remained above freezing until almost midnight.  Then, the wet steps and porch began getting slick with ice.  Our forecast contained a chance of snow, but that did not happen.

I cleaned out our wood stove and rebuilt the fire among other piddling chores accomplished today.

Wet leaves.

.

Saturday, 12/27/14

Late Fall or Early Winter?

It's starting to look a lot like winter around here.

.

Late Fall or Early Winter?

Fall Color Past

A strong and gusty south wind blew all day Wednesday preceding the arrival of a new cold front. The wind stripped away almost all our colorful leaves. Only the oaks managed to hold onto their brown leaves. Oh, well. All things must pass.

.

Fall Color Past

Along The Winter Creek

Sunday afternoon Jo and I and the dogs decided not to walk our normal route and walk along the winter creek that runs through our place instead. (The dogs certainly didn't object. Rusty and Bucket are always ready to go and don't really care where.) Walking the creek is more like exploring. You cannot manage anything close to a walking pace because of the steep sides and all the rocks and boulders strewn about.





The creek should be flowing this time of year, but we haven't received enough rain this year. There were just a few pools of water scattered along the way. There were also "pools" of loose, dry leaves where the water should have been. These leaf pools made walking even more treacherous. A few of the larger ones were waist deep. A pool of water you can see, but when you step off into a pool of leaves, you think you're stepping onto firm ground, but step off into nothingness instead. Both Jo and I fell several time. Fortunately, there were no hidden rocks where we fell and the leaves provided a soft landing. We completely lost sight of Rusty when he unknowingly jumped off into one of the deeper leaf pools. He quickly dog paddled to the surface and swam onto firm ground.

Along The Winter Creek

Last Day of 2007

This is where our normal afternoon walk starts during the winter. From here, we walk up to the upper pasture.














A little fern trying its best to split a boulder. Given enough time and help from other plants and the elements, it will succeed.













Leaves in the little winter creek right behind the house. Oh, how I wish this little creek flowed year round.

Last Day of 2007

Nature's Pinwheel

Movement from this little gadget caught my eye as I walked along the rock bluffs the other day. It's just a few leaves caught in a spider's web suspended from the rocks, but it spun nicely in a light breeze.

Nature's Pinwheel

Finally Fall

The tree leaves are finally starting to color and it's beginning to look a little more like fall around these parts. The color change is two or three weeks behind schedule which seems to be the case in most of the rest of the country. Some claim that the color change is governed more by day length than by temperature. I cannot believe that. Our days have been getting shorter right on schedule as they do every year. It's the cooler temperatures that are lagging behind.

Finally Fall

No Black Walnuts This Year

The black walnut tree leaves and flowers were looking good before our freeze a couple of weeks ago. Two nights with temperatures in the middle twenties did them in -- completely.

How badly a tree's leaves were damaged seemed to depend upon its stage of new leaf growth. Those whose leaves had been on for a little while faired okay. Sweetgums show little damage. Hickory, black walnut and red oak got hit the hardest, losing all their new leaves and, even worse, flowers. The hickory began recovering quickest, with new leaf buds erupting only a few days after the freeze. I'm just now beginning to see a few new leaf buds on the red oak and walnuts.

No Black Walnuts This Year

Jerry Burns Leaves

On Wednesday Jerry Joe came down to burn off leaves in the woods just northeast of our place.








Jo wasn't happy about the fires and decided she better get our sheets and towels off the clothesline before they picked up a burnt leaf aroma.




Our "watch dogs" were oblivious to Jerry Joe's arrival. However, they went ballistic when he left. One of them decided to get a better look at Jerry's departure by standing up and planting his/her front feet on the window sill, knocking off a whole tray of small houseplants. (The guilty party would not confess and neither Rusty nor Bucket would rat the other out.) None of the flower pots broke, but several of the trays they sit on did. The resulting mess was considerable, making Jo even less happy. I decided the best thing for my to do was go to my shop and stay out of Jo's way for a while.

Jerry Burns Leaves