Fall-ing in Love Again

American Lady with Blue Mistflowers and Rudbeckia

I am so happy that Fall is here. I'm not talking about pumpkin spice or sweater weather. I love fall because this is when the wildflowers are at their peak and the butterflies arrive in force. The bees and wasps will have been busy all summer, but the butterflies like to wait until the flowers are at their tastiest and most beautiful. It's my favorite time to lead kids on hikes at the Nature Center. We see so much! Spiders, caterpillars, butterflies, stick bugs, mantises. Fall is full of life. I learned to love fall wildflowers when we lived in Florida and I worked at Morningside Nature Center. I got to know the flowers of the Longleaf Pine Sandhill there, which is one of the most beautiful things ever. Click here to read my blog about it: https://earthteachme.blogspot.com/2013/09/morningside.html I started my flower garden at home to attract butterflies when I saw how they loved the wildflowers in the sandhill. The flower show in our garden starts small in the spring with welcome but small sprouts of green and flashes of yellow and pink. But by fall it is a mad burst of purple and gold, tall stems tumbling over each other. I could barely walk the path through the middle of the garden today because it had grown so thick. But the result is a moving carpet of rainbow colors, buzzing, fluttering, and chirping. The birds, rabbits, squirrels and deer love it too. 

Katydid

Fall is the time that I get to step back and just admire and enjoy the fruits of my labors. It's my reward for the sweaty work planting, watering and weeding that I do in the spring and summer, though admittedly, nature does most of the work. It's a joy to just step out the front door and be surrounded by such beauty. I take far too many pictures. It makes me happy to see other people pass by the yard and stop for a picture of their own. A runner yesterday waved and said "¡Que Rico!" and blew kisses to the flowers. It makes me feel good to provide a nature sanctuary on a busy corner where campus buses drive by every few minutes and commuters line up at the beginning and end of their day. I love this garden.

On the Bus Route--Goldenrod and Asters Abound

American Lady, Blue Mistflower, and the Commuters

Fall is also hurricane season. It's been a wild week. On Thursday we watched the destruction in Florida as hurricane Helene grew to a category 4 storm.We anxiously waited for it to roar over the top of Athens during the night. I took pictures of the garden on Thursday, fully expecting that it would all be smashed flat by the storm the next day. But Friday morning we woke to light rain and some wind gusts and found that we had come through mercifully unscathed. The storm had taken a more easterly path. But then we saw the terrible damage as it tore through up the eastern half of the state and up to the Carolinas, Tennessee and Kentucky. There was some damage in our town, but nothing like what happened all around us. We feel very lucky--the devastation and loss is shocking. Some of those communities will never be the same again. Our garden was untouched.

The Day Before the Storm 

Then on Sunday we started getting reports of a toxic chemical fire in Conyers, about 40 miles to the west, and to be prepared to stay inside with windows closed if the chemical cloud started to drift our way. Luckily the fire seems to be under control and the cloud has not made it here yet, though it looks like the toxicity would be diluted by the wind by the time it got here if it did. But 17,000 people were told to evacuate, many to Athens. Crazy. What's next? An asteroid? Volcano?

Not smelling any chlorine because the toxic cloud was far away, I took a walk around Lake Herrick, where I used to walk all the time and in January had started writing about for an exercise in exploring place. I've been avoiding going there--it just makes me sad since the nursing student was murdered there in February (see previous blogs). I hadn't been there since June. I decided to go see if I could find any of the birds that had been reported after the hurricane (I didn't). It was nice to walk the trails again, but it still felt sad. This summer the university installed numerous emergency call boxes throughout the woods as a safety measure. I understand why they put them in, but for me, seeing the bright red light in the woods just reminds me that it is a sad place. I'm just not sure I can write about my connection to the place any more. I get distracted by the misery. So I am letting that "Journey in Place" project go. I'll certainly go back to Lake Herrick over and over again. But reflecting on my feelings there is too sad, and I feel like having the project hanging over me has been a burden that kept me from being able to write at all. I've been stuck. But walking home from Lake Herrick, I saw my garden up ahead in the distance, all full of movement and life, and I felt relief, and the urge to write about it. Just the nudge I needed. Thank you, garden, for giving me joy, beauty, and peace.

Pearl Crescent on Rudbeckia

Cabbage White on Blue Mistflower

Yellow Collared Scape Moth on Blue Mistflower

Fiery Skipper on Blue Mistflower

Buckeye on Blue Mistflower

American Snout on Blue Mistflower

Ocola Skipper on Blue Mistflower

Swamp Sunflower

Leafcutter Bee on Blue Mistflower

Ailanthus Webworm Moth on Blue Mistflower

Georgia Aster

First Monarch of Fall

Fall Colors: Blue

Here it is-- the last day of fall. Tomorrow is the Winter Solstice. A few freezing nights have toasted just about all the fall blooms, except for a few that were protected close to the ground or close to the house. The prevailing landscape colors are muted earth tones, and they are lovely. But every so often, I glimpse a flash of blue as a bluebird or bluejay zips past, or catch the brilliant blue sky from between the branches of the leafless trees and it jolts me awake from my cold weather nap. Blue is my favorite color and has been since I was little. My first memory of loving the color comes after I visited Hansen Planetarium in Salt Lake. Somehow I got it into my head that stars were blue. Maybe they appeared that way on the dome of the planetarium, or maybe we looked at a mineral that had some blue in it, but Cobalt blue seemed magical ever after, and is the one that really makes my heart sing, though most blues will do it for me. Lapis lazuli. Sigh. Blue makes me smile, quickens my pulse, brightens my eyes. It pops. Blue symbolizes hope and promise, loyalty and calm. Blue skies peeking through the clouds let us know there is hope and a future after the storm. It also symbolizes sadness to some, though not to me. "The Bluebird of Happiness" "Blue Skies, smiling at me, nothing but blue skies, do I see". After the year we've just been through, I definitely need more blue in my world. 

Carolina Chickadee feasts on the blue fruits of invasive privet

Blue tail of an immature 5 Lined Skink on a warmer day

Waning Moon in a bright blue sky

Tiny Bluejay feather

Great Blue Heron shows tinges of blue on the edges of its wings

Belted Kingfisher, blue with cold! (It was 28 degrees that morning)

Clear Blue Skies and Bare Trees

A hungry bee feeding from the last of the Blue Salvia

Bluebird of Happiness (Eastern Bluebird)

Brighter Days ahead

Fall Colors: Purple

Purple is a restful color. Not fiery red, not cool blue--but a pleasant and tranquil mix. We need more purple in our lives. Just a month ago, the color purple was everywhere. Purple asters sprinkled among the goldenrod that carpeted the roadsides, and clusters of purple berries and grapes hung ready to be gobbled by hungry birds and deer. But in December, the flowers are mostly spent and the beautyberry fruit, and poke and virginia creeper berries are mostly gone, save for a few that escaped the cold and the herbivory. Their days are numbered. Too late for Red-spotted Purple butterflies, and too early for violets. But walking around the woods and in my yard, I still was able to find a few bright purples flashes holding out before winter turns the landscape all brown and tan and white. 

In the fall, Sweetgum leaves come in all the colors. This one is purple, but I've found
yellow, orange, red and brown too.

Moss Phlox blossoms in the Playscape at the Nature Center

A clump of Beautyberries that made it through the first frost

A few Georgia Aster blooms are hanging on in our sheltered pond garden

The flowers of Muhly grass are like soft purple clouds in the front yard

The underside of a Crane-fly Orchid leaf (Tipularia discolor) is bright purple surprise

Spores from big white Puff Ball fungi leave purple/brown discs on the grass

 These Purple Cort (Cortinarius) mushrooms were so lovely that I had to include them, even though
I saw these  a few years back on a hike with the Ramblers

Purple Finches came with the migrant warblers and a few have stayed around,
now hanging with the Robins and Cedar Waxwings

Violet Toothed Polypores, I believe. I don't know my fungi. My only clue is the purple edge.