Red leaf and acorns is an appropriate title for today’s blog as we talk about the cooler autumn days. The bright sun is out and the plants in my garden can finally take a break from the hot and humid summer days.
In fact, I noticed several plants have a bit of new growth on them including my two new holly plants.
Red Maple Leaf
So one day, I noticed a striking red leaf near my front door. Everything is so perfect in nature, isn’t it? This is actually a leaf from a maple tree. On the one bottom edge there is a bit of orange red coloring.
I remember years ago, my mom received a red maple leaf through the mail. She stopped what she was doing to take a good look at it. I guess it brought back some childhood memories of their farm and the trees.
Of course, this is only one leaf, of many, on my lawn this year. Great news is that we finally put together a mulching station of sorts using a large bit of wire and some metal stakes. We raked and tossed in all the fallen leaves into our mulching station.
Hopefully, I guess we’ll see in the summer if they are nicely mulched and ready to be worked into the soil of the vegetable garden.
If you notice on the photograph below, the soil has been forked up some to give a little oxygen to the roots of some my sedums. I was told sedums like airy soil.
I oxygenated the soil near the sedum plants by using a forked gardening tool and some muscle/foot power.
Acorns & Oak Trees
The second part of today’s blog deals with acorns. In the neighborhood, I noticed a large oak tree with multiple acorns under it. Wow, this is a real feast for some hungry squirrels. I hope they save a few for winter’s chill.
The oak trees I grew up with were live oak trees. In fact, they never lost their leaves in the fall nor did we ever water them. The acorns from live oak trees were also thinner and longer with a pointed end. The acorns in today’s photograph, almost looks circular.
Live oak tress are very strong, majestic, slow growing and sturdy. One time, we cut down a live oak three that was too close to the house’s front porch. It was a huge job to cut it down. The trunk and branches weighted hundreds of pounds, You had to judge where the cut limb would fall before the final cut.
As a child, I remember having a little outdoor play area with a toy pink washing machine without a lid and a rusty metal utility cart; that was the kitchen. I had a squarish looking large cut oak piece for the table, (This was probably at least two feet across). Then I used smaller oak logs for the chairs. Somehow it all worked out if you were child-sized. I rolled the pieces to get them in place as I could never lift them. For the kitchen’s play food, I collected seeds from plants in the yard. And, of course, I had a few old pots and perhaps a stick or large spoons to stir those pretend meals up with.
Ending Notes for Red Leaf and Acorns Blog
I’m thinking it’s nice to end today’s blog on a happy note.
So, enjoy the day. Hope you are able to get out to see a few red leaves and acorns.