Out and About for Autumn

Tomorrow is December 1, but technically, it's still autumn. But the colors are all gone, and it no longer looks like fall. Those fall colors we look forward to so much are quickly gone, so I do a lot of driving about to photograph them all. First place I go to for autumn splendor is my hometown area of St. Joseph Michigan.

I always be sure to visit Fernwood Botanical Gardens while I'm in town. This lovely public garden was a favorite of my grandmother, so of course it became a favorite of mine. The weather wasn't very good that day, but it was still lovely. Like I said, weather doesn't slow me down much.

While I was there, I had the good fortune to experience a gale on Lake Michigan. In case you find that statement puzzling, I am highly invigorated by stormy beaches. I've always wanted to see the beach during one of these wind storms, so I was thrilled to be there exactly then. I quite literally stayed there the whole day, just taking pictures and loving it! I was sandblasted and cold, but I loved it, start to finish. Trust me, these are only a few of the pix I took that day!

It only lasted for one day, so I had other calmer days to be at my beloved beaches. My favorites are Silver Beach, Rocky Gap, Jean Klock, and Tiscornia. It was cold, but I'm a pretty tough cookie when it comes to weather. As long as I'm there were I like to be, it doesn't much matter if I'm cold. Now my next dream is to visit there in winter. I haven't seen the lake all frozen since my youth.

By the time I got back home to Ohio, the fall color show had started here. And it starts with the Circleville Pumpkin Show. I'm always fascinated by just how many different foods can be made with pumpkin. The answer is a LOT. Next year, I'll try to actually count and record them all. We tasted pumpkin chili, pumpkin cookies, pumpkin cider, and pumpkin butter. All were delicious! If you look closely, you can see that the winning pumpkin was over 1400 lbs. Now that's quite a pumpkin! Dr. Ligget has won this honor many times. Some years ago, the master gardeners visited his pumpkin patch, and I like to remember where these winners come from.

I always make a quick drive through Blacklick Metro Park specifically to snap pix of the lovely Sweetgum trees I know are there. For this trip, I make sure to wait for a blue sky day, because I know I'll be pointing my camera skyward.

For the last few years, I haven't been able to hit Chestnut Ridge on a blue sky day. By the time that the colors there are peaking, I'm always afraid to delay much longer. It's okay, the colors are brighter on a cloudy day.

As the weather continued to deteriorate, I hit Franklin Park Conservatory for more formal autumn beauty. They do such a fabulous job, but even for me, the weather was awful. I didn't last long in the cold rain. My weather toughness has its limits.

Inniswood Metro Gardens is one of my favorite spots to see garden textures. Their landscaping team is extraordinary. I  visit at various times through the year, but I personally think autumn is the best.

My final stop is always Dawes Aboretum. My favorite part of Dawes is that it has a driving trail, so that you can see it all without wearing yourself out hiking for miles. It doesn't have many formal gardens, but lots of beautiful trees. I especially like the long views of the Ohio countryside you can see on the drive. It was really cold that day, but clear, so I mostly took pictures from inside my warm car.

It's pretty obvious that autumn is my absolute favorite. I try to love each season as it comes, but there's just something special about the fall foliage. During that one week of peak color, I literally plan out each day so that I don't miss any of these favorite spots. We had an early snow this year, and my own garden was already sleeping this November. You know there isn't much to see when these are the only pictures I took at home the whole month. Luckily, I have all those autumn hot spots in my memory bank.

October is the Garden's Finale

Here in central Ohio, October can start off pretty summery, but by month's end there's usually a drastic change. Still, there's no guarantee that it will end chilly and bare. Some years, we're still fairly warm, with plenty of fall color yet to enjoy. Other years, you'll find the end of October to be a harbinger of winter. Today will be a little bit of both. It's rainy, with warmer temperatures for morning, but by tonight it will change over to bitter cold. My flowers will come to an end, which is fitting for the last day of the month.

The rain should stop soon, and I'll go out to gather a final bouquet or two. From a distance, the zinnias still look good, but up close I probably won't find many to pick. I'm always sad on this day, but part of me is ready to let it go. I have bulbs to plant yet, and my own personal rule is that the zinnias have to be gone first, since it's easier to plant bulbs with them out of the way. The difficult part of my rule is it is invariably pretty darned cold when I finally getting around to planting my tulips and such. Oh but I'll be so glad I did when next spring arrives!

On the warmer days this month, which extended until just a few days ago, I still had many butterflies passing through Robin's Nest. My biggest draws for them were the zinnias, butterfly bush, and verbena bonariensis. These continue to bloom right up until a hard freeze, so they're die hards here. We've already had a couple of frosts, but they weren't strong enough to cause much damage. Tonight will likely be different, since they're calling for a freeze warning instead of frost. It's time, I'm ready.

Sulfur butterfly

Buckeye butterfly

Corn ear worm moth

Monarch

Painted lady

Swallowtail caterpillars

Orange sulfur

Since my family doesn't live nearby, I don't decorate much for holidays indoors. And yet I love to decorate the outdoors. I think it's because decorating the outdoors feels like gardening. I do harvest decorations instead of Halloween, and leave it out until Thanksgiving. After that, it will be time for winter greens that stay out into March.

I've done a lot of traveling about this month, trying to soak up the autumn vibes in all of my favorite places. But I decided to do a second post about that, since there is so much to share. So today I'm just showing off the 2019 finale of Robin's Nest. November and December may have a few things to see, but I know it will be meager compared to summer's bounty winding down.

It really was a banner year here. We had a lot of rain early on, and everything got a big boost from it. I overplanted, as I often do, so it was a  jungle. The jungle can be a bounteous beauty, but I find it to be prone to pests and disease. I'd say I'll try to rein it in next year, but that's not likely to be how it turns out. Time will tell. And I have no garden sunsets to close with this month. Instead, I'll show off the eagles that have been gracing the nearby ponds. I've discovered that if I go down there about an hour before sunset, there's a good chance I'll see them. My camera has a 50X zoom, but more would sure be better when it comes to these beauties. I think they're a fitting finale too.