Here in beautiful western North Carolina, where I live, the leaves have not yet shown any inclination to change colors. This may be because the temperatures, until this week, have been in the 80s every day and the nights have not been cool enough to trigger color changes.
I haven't seen any wooly worms yet either -- those old timey prognosticators about winter. The rings on those black and auburn 'caterpillars' are supposed to forecast the severity of the upcoming winter. Maybe this warm autumn will spill over to winter and we'll have a warm winter as well. Right now we have been getting lashings of rain due to the hurricane -- several roads are closed, as are the schools, and an emergency shelter has been opened. All this is from rainfall as we don't live near a river. We also had the wettest July on record and the wettest August. Probably the wettest September on record as well, but I haven't seen the official record on that. So our ground was pretty saturated already. I don't need to consult any of the woolly worm's kin to know all this ground saturation does not bode well for the plethora of mature trees around here. And I fear for them. I feel helpless to help out the trees, to dry out the soil a bit on their behalf. All I can do is fret and keep my fingers crossed -- and I know that isn't helping a darn thing. Well, I can share a tree picture below of a Possumhaw tree I took at Daniel Stowe Botanical Garden in Belmont, North Carolina. The name 'possumhaw' made me smile and I hope it will make you smile too. So we can all stop worrying about the weather for a little while. |
Ruthie RosauerRuthie photographs trees because she loves them. Archives
February 2019
CategoriesUpcoming EventsDecember 7 1 - 3pm A Walk in the Woods 423 N. Main St. Hendersonville, NC BOOK SIGNING Photographer and editor Ruthie Rosauer will be on hand to autograph copies of her book, THESE TREES. The book, a compilation of 140 trees photos paired with poems, has been described as "A gorgeous book, a heart-opening photo collection." |