The most colourful

November 17, 2024

 things in the woods today, other than me..

Yes, it is nearing the end of the two week rifle hunt for white tailed deer in Central Ontario. If one wants to wander the woods, they'd best wear blaze orange for safety. 

 This frozen mushroom was just lying in the middle of the trail, dropped from somewhere, by whom??

Here and there, protruding rocks are clothed in green moss.

Now I can see the fluttering flagging tape I tied near the spots where the morels grow in spring.

This oak leaf, alone and brilliant.

The colourful sheet of leaves that Mother Nature dropped, has now faded into a myriad of tan, brown and beige colours.

Even under the Hemlocks, there are enough deciduous trees to put a layer of leaves across the soil.

Hopefully she will soon be adding the white duvet of snow over the landscape.

The healthy size of the thorns on these Hawthorne bushes dotting old farm fields, makes one wonder why they evolved to this size, and what was nature protecting the bushes from?

Milkweed pods have dried and fluffed. Just touching these cause the little parachutes to float off on the faintest breeze.

This is a Eastern White Cedar log laying beside a trail, gleaming white in the sunshine.

A red squirrel has been shredding the bark while harvesting it to line his winter quarters. 

 The temperatures have been unusually mild over the last two weeks with just a couple of nippy days. We've only dropped the window on the Hot Frame for a couple of the cooler nights, and I still have lettuce growing under an old window in one of the raised beds. We have still not had a hard, killing frost, so I am able to harvest parsley and sage, although the deer have nibbled most of the parsley down to bare stems. There seems to be more, or bolder, deer around this year. We are discussing more serious measures for next spring, to protect the gardens.

"The last rose of summer...."

November 2, 2024

Well, not a rose exactly....

But a few blooms I picked, expecting frost...but we still haven't had a killing frost. Snow, yes...twice. 

 On the morning of October 28, there was a white dusting all over. It melted off by noon, but it was the first snow.

  

 

On the 29th, things had melted and dried, and the leaves were perfect for a 'rustling' walk.

The last few days of October were very warm, and early in the morning of Oct. 31, the temperature was 17C.(63F) We had coffee on the verandah and watched the dawn light grow through the leafless branches.

Yesterday, the temperature dropped as the day progressed,  and this morning there is a skiff of snow. The fire was lit, after a couple days of not even needing it.

There are still a few spots of pretty colour here and there in the bush.

A flock of wild turkeys has been hanging out around here. We have seen them several times here and there around the yard...The trail camera behind the barn captured them foraging. There is an apple tree there, with some fruit remaining, and also some oak trees with acorns, so food for them. 

Apparently this one also wanted to be on 'Bird Cam'....We think the small flock is an hen with this spring's poults. You can see the spur on this one's leg.

In  between the ups and downs in the weather, I got to spend some time doing a bit of crafting. The pieces for this bag have been languishing on my table since early spring.

Pieces of old jeans and some pretty fabric from a thrift store made this draw-string project bag, with pockets all around.

The little fabric box holds clips contained, while doing future projects; the fabric bits and pieces matching the pin cushions I made previously.

Almost November...

 October 27, 2024

And we still haven't had a severe frost. Some salvia, alyssum and calendula are soldiering on despite almost nightly skimmers of frost. Only on one night so far, was the window-lid lowered on the cold frame, as it seemed we were in for it, but overnight, the clouds rolled in and it wasn't necessary after all. 

The trees have pretty much all shed their leaves, except oaks and beeches, and some young trees of the under storey. Leaves have been collected and bagged, and the garlic is nestled in and mulched. Everything is pretty much ready for winter around here. We replaced a window in the upper storey, as the closure had failed on the old one. The only way to secure the window would have been to climb a ladder, push it shut from outside, and lock it on the inside. It's too soon to shut things down, as we have had quite a stretch of warm, sunny weather. It has been great for getting the garden and yard readied for winter. 

Recently we did a bit of touring around. While waiting to have the anti-rust treatment done on the car, we explored a bit of Petawawa. We found Centennial Park, where the Petawawa river descends over falls and through some rapids, below Garrison Petawawa, and shortly enters the Ottawa River.

We have paddled the upper reaches of the river, near it's birth place on the West side of Algonquin Park. It was interesting to see how large and powerful it gets before merging with the Ottawa.

 Just south of the confluence, there is a beach on the Ottawa River.

Nothing has shown up on Bird Cam. this week, except Blue Jays. There are some Juncos hanging around, and we spotted a flight of Snow Buntings recently. Yesterday, whilst doing a bit more trail pruning in our bush, a Chickadee came close in the branches around us, and was making little chips. It is obviously a bird with a memory from last winter, and was looking for a hand out. It will very soon be time to set up the winter bird feeders.

Some visitors showing up on Barn Cam. 

Spike is still hanging out where there are late falling apples. 

These guys were checking out the space, probably because there are does here. It is that time of year....

 

And then, there is the mystery photo...a foggy night, a buck with brush on his antlers???? A slow exposure? A trick of the camera??

 

  Yesterday, I happened to look out just in time to see a black blob disappear behind the barn...sure enough...there were more....

  

It's that time of year....

 October 14, 2024

Fall is always a busy time, dismantling gardens, preserving and/or storing the harvest, and getting everything ready for the coming cold. Every time I go outside with a specific goal in mind, so many other little things seem to line up to be done before the major chore...and time flies by, but gradually, things are being accomplished. All the water barrels have to be drained, temporary eavestroughs removed, any thing that would not benefit from being frozen, has to be put into heated buildings. All the garden beds need to be cleared out, stakes and cages stored, manure and compost spread. Finally the temperatures have dropped enough that pollinators are very scarce now. I like to have everything tidy and ship shape before Mother Nature lays her blankets of frost and snow.

We have not had a killing frost yet, just mornings of patchy frost here and there on the grass. 

We still have a couple of rows of spuds to dig. The temperature in the root cellar has come down to an acceptable number, so after a few days drying on screens in the barn, they will be all checked over and stored.

Voles have been very prolific this year, and they have done a little damage on some potatoes, eaten big chunks out of my peppers, and have been chewing on carrot tops. I have been harvesting peppers since they were big enough, have used them in two big batches of pasta sauce, made red pepper jelly, roasted red pepper ketchup, dehydrated a few, and have diced and frozen some. This is the final harvest. It has been a good pepper year.

 We've certainly been enjoying the fresh greens from the hot frame, and so far, it has not been cold enough to make me lower the glass.

Some pictures from the trail cameras recently. We've put a new camera down on a late-ripening apple tree behind the barn, and it has garnered some interesting shots. This sequence of a doe eating an apple...

Spike...

 Mama bear and her fat, lazy cub...

who managed to climb up and jiggle the camera angle after this shot, as further pictures after this one were of the ground. Thankfully no damage was done.

Birds, squirrels and mice are still appearing on 'Bird Cam' on the branch of the oak tree. Robins are still here,

and this is a similarly sized thrush, a Hermit or Wood thrush??

Leaves are coloured and beginning to fall. Thanksgiving is the time of peak autumn colour around here. A couple of pictures of some colour in the woods.

                                        Happy Thanksgiving.

A bit of this and that, and winter prep....

 October 2, 2024

We've had a lovely stretch of warm, sunny days to finish off September. October has started a little cooler due to an overnight cold front that pushed through and dropped an inch of rain last night. Autumn mornings are very dew-wet, and sometimes quite foggy, but the sun has been able to burn off the fog, and dry up the dew, until by afternoon, it is perfect to be outdoors.

I recently sliced up a bevvy of fresh garden vegetables, and made canned coleslaw. We'll see if we like it.

Some garden-fresh red peppers going under the broiler for roasting...roasted red pepper jelly in the making.

A recent warm afternoon was perfect to clean all the garlic and onions and get them prepared for winter storage. There are a few shallots there as well. This is the first time growing them. The red onions were grown from seed, the yellow from sets, and there isn't a very noticeable difference in size between them.

I potted up a couple of pretty geraniums, and some coleus for bringing indoors later. Behind them is a little fig tree I got this spring, and it has grown 3 figs. No chance of them ripening before frost!

The plum trees are prepped for winter with firmly staked deer deterrent cages to prevent the winter winds from bowling them over. The trunks are wrapped to prevent vole chewing. There seem to be a lot of voles around this fall, and if we get a good depth of snow this winter, they will create havoc under it. Two winters ago, they girdled an unprotected small crab apple tree, and killed it. Lesson learned...wrap the baby trees!

There is a bit of leaf colour appearing around the clearing, and expect it to intensify over the next couple of weeks.

 

 Garden clear out is awaiting frost now. In the meantime, there are still cherry tomatoes, lots of greens, and the root crops are still in the ground. I'd love to get at it, but the root cellar is still a little too warm for storage...and these guys are still active.