Random Thoughts Thursday

Summer is officially over. The corn patch has been picked, eaten, or frozen. The tomato plants look wilted and brown but continue to bear fruit. My perennial beds are going to seed. I leave most of the plants up for the birds and to provide cover for insects to overwinter. The black walnut trees started dropping leaves mid-August. They are the last to leaf out and the first to shed.

The timber rattlesnakes are on the move again. We saw them in June, when they passed through the yard, traveling from their winter dens to their favorite summer feeding and breeding spots. One very large old-timer hung around one of the barns for several weeks until it molted its old skin. Now they’re traveling back to their dens where they’ll overwinter and give birth.

Crickets and cicadas are noisy. Bees are busy gathering pollen from the golden rod, their last good food source. Soon asters will be the only flower blooming. The trees look tired, their leaves beginning to show brown spots and edges. A sweet smell of decay from fallen leaves is already in the air. The apples are ripening. It’s time to haul out the cider press and put up some of that sweet goodness for the winter.

The deer are shedding their red coats and will grow a thick, dull brown fur for the winter. The swan’s goslings are molting their gray baby feathers and growing white flight feathers so they can leave with the adults when our world ices over. Chipmunks and squirrels are busy gathering acorns and black walnuts from the yard to store. It’s an industrious time of year.

I’m fortunate to live in an area with four seasons and I love them all.