Friday, October 5, 2007

The Autumn Leaves



The Nashville area experienced a myriad of extreme weather conditions this year. We had a relatively mild winter, and the temperatures warmed up early in March. However, Easter weekend, we had a cold (and I do mean COLD) snap, followed by a couple of hard freezes and snow. . .UGH. A lot of trees and bushes, particularly the flowering trees, sustained a lot of damage. Many of them died, and those that recovered had fewer leaves than normal.


It seems like we went directly from that cold snap to HOT weather. And, this summer, we had day after day of 90+ degree weather days,. During August, we had weeks of triple-digit temperatures. In addition, we experienced a drought. Many trees or bushes, already taxed from the weird, spring weather, just dried up in the heat.

Normally, if we have enough rain in the spring and summer, the autumn leaves turn red, gold, orange, spice, burgundy and yellow. This year, the leaves are pretty lackluster. As you can see in the photo above, we seem to have two colors. . . .khaki and brown. Like so many other trees all over the mid-state area, the trees in the middle of this photo are, most likely, dead and not just losing leaves. It will be interesting to see what happens next spring.



11 comments:

isa said...

Crazy weather!
Little disappointed about the foliage this year :-( We'll be soon making our trek to FL and usually we enjoy the TN color show...

Denton said...

Yes, it takes some moisture before Fall for the leaves to put on their best show ...I find it interesting how close we are yet we are weeks away from your colors.

quintarantino said...

Funny... I guess I left here a comment. But it isn´t here...
Your pronunciation on my homeland as the correct idea. It's almost there.
As for how far it is form Lisbon it's 400 km to North.
Seems to me you endend up well even tough not getting that Law pratice. Never to late.

Ming the Merciless said...

I love the colors of the foliage. Strangely enough, we haven't had any color change in the leaves up here. In fact, it has been extremely warm and humid this last couple of weeks.

Steve Cuddihy said...

The sign of the changing of the seasons....excellent capture.

lv2scpbk said...

It was crazy weather this year. I see you got a fall photo but the leaves might change more color in a week or two.

I left you a message under your comment on my blog. It was under Farm Scene. Have you been to my area?

Gwen said...

Do you have a photo of the foliage from your last autumn season you could post to compare for us..I see what you mean with the trees in the middle lacking fall color. About the mural...I couldn't find much info on it, but I think it might have been commissioned by the business that has the mural on the wall.

Anonymous said...

Well, as odd as it might seem, you are farther along in the color category than we are. I wonder why that happened? We are way farther north than you????

Nice photo. I am looking forward to the fall colors here too and with our never-ending drought and heat (in the 90s today and tomorrow) I would have bet my horse we would be raking leaves any day now.

I been working hard on a new blog and am finishing the "categories" right now. When they are done I will begin filling them in with unpublished photos. You can see the categories now...

Flat-out different: Brookville, Ohio 45309

quintarantino said...

Just to say Hi...

Chris said...

Unfortunately, the colors are a bit misleading. While those trees appear a little orange, they are actually orange-brown and dead. . .Seriously, our leaves have not started to turn. Anything that is changing is brown because it's dead. Slinger, I'll see if I can find a photo from last year.

Gerald (Ackworth born) said...

Interesting account but nature has a way of recovering from these vagaries of the season so when the deadwood had died something new will appear come spring.