Fall is clearly on its way. The air the past few days has been chilly in the mornings, and has a noticeable lack of humidity (at least compared with summer's sauna). D. and I spent last night fighting for the blanket, a blanket which will soon need to be supplemented with additional coverings. There have been grey days, but few ones in which the clouds bring rain. I'm quite enjoying this weather; I'm anticipating being able to walk to work again, and am pleased to be able to wear my favorite hikey shoes and fleecey sweatshirts.
The trees are not yet turning. A few are shedding some dead brown leaves, but nothing more than that. The crabapple in the neighbor's yard that covered the ground with fruit last year appears to have produced nothing this year. The chokecherry has fruit, but, again, not as much as before. The apple does not seem to have any.
The garden plants are putting out there last efforts. Most of the sunflowers have been taken out and the seeds sorted. One plant produced fat striped seeds; another thin striped seeds. One made small dark black seeds; the other short dark seeds with faint stripes. It will be interesting to see if they throw true when I next plant them. The squashes are basically dead. One succumbed to the summer heat; the others were parasitized by something that chewed them up from the inside. I rescued one tiny butternut before its vine dried up; it's the size and shape of a pear. The cucumber continues to put out its curly, prickly fruit; the tomatoes continue to hang on. The eggplants are starting to put out a bunch of new purple flowers, but I have my doubts as to whether they'll make it before the weather gets too cool for them. The bell pepper has some fruits; we'll see if I can harvest them before they succumb to rot like the last two. The beans are in a late-season frenzy; I've been harvesting the ripe beans from the pods as they dry. The Paint Dry beans are beautiful - white with a a golden spot - but the Cherokee Wax beans are confusing. They are supposed to be small burgandy-colored beans (like small kidney beans) but so far I've collected one huge pink bean and a bunch of tiny, shiny black ones. Again, it'll be interesting to see if this continues in the next generation. The Moon and Stars melons have perked up in the cooler weather, but there has been no increase in the size of the actual melons for a while. There are about five of them, all a little smaller than a tennis ball. (Individual melons!) The carrots continue to do well, quietly enlarging in their bin. The lettuce have all gone to seed, as have the amaranth; I'll need to spend some time harvesting from both of them.
After a hiatus, the birds are back enjoying the feeder. Newcomers include a nuthatch and several hummingbirds. Besides that it's the usual crew of House sparrows, chickadees, cardinals and doves. In a probably related development, the random visiting cat is not visiting as much. Unclear what accounts for the change, which is as mysterious as the cat's appearance in the first place. Cicadas continue to die off; it's not uncommon to find their strange bodies dying on the ground. Other insects seem as lively as ever; there were lots of orange beetles, bumblebees, and metallic green "bees" on the thistles near the driveway.
I'm glad to be out of the summer heat.
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