October Oaks

© Robin Edmundson, 'October Oaks', watercolor.

October is my favorite month!   So much color, so many shapes, such fabulous light.

Our oak trees put on quite a show here and they use aaaallll the colors.   How can I not be inspired?

We're likely going to get our first frost tonight.  Today I'll bring the bay tree and rosemary pots inside. I took down the hummingbird feeders yesterday. It's time to stock up on birdseed and suet for the winter. It won't be long until we hear the sandhills flying south for the season. 

I have a goal this winter to get over to the Goose Pond observation building and do some painting of the birds.  Sounds like fun, right?

Tree Crystals

OK, they're not really crystals, but the cellular structure of this fallen tree really reminds me of a square crystalline structure. 

It's a red oak.   Blow the pics up for a better look.

The white is a fungus - spalting - between the layers of wood.

The tree fell in a mighty wind this winter.  It had been rotting for a long time and you could see right through it at the bottom. [See top link]

It's an interesting way to see wood.  Not like looking at boards or firewood at all. 

Leaves

I thought the russet color of these oak leaves was pretty against the woods. 

New Oak Leaves

I passed these on one of our wild back paths and thought they were pretty.  

Everything this year was zooming ahead by a month, then we had a hard freeze and a lot of the trees got stopped in their tracks.    The oaks and low lying locusts especially got hit.   They just started over again.    The new leaves are beautiful and contrast nicely with the fully developed leaves of the maples, ets.  


And our locust tree is just blooming now....

Oaks

We have a lot of oak trees.

All kinds of oak trees.   Red, white, pinoak, swamp, etc.   

They like it here and I am happy to have them here.

They're the last of the trees to turn colors in the fall and they display the widest variation in color.

They're big and solid and patient and productive.

I love them.

Oak Leaf

A Little Dusty

These oak leaves are on our road.  They are not a fancy variegated type.    They're just plain dusty.

Everything is dusty.    The grass is dusty.   The gardens are dusty.   The cars are dusty.  The porch is dusty.   The house is dusty.   The trees are dusty.   The dirt is dusty. 

These are the conditions that produced the Dust Bowl of the 1920s.  Regularly disturbed soil and hot dry weather.    The county comes by to grade our road a few times a year - to get the potholes out of it and to smooth out the washboards.   They dump more gravel if need be.    Sometimes they make it better, sometimes they just rearrange the mess.   Always, they make more dust.