Outdoor Adventures with Gary Lee - Vol. 384
Over fifty percent of the pretty fall leaves are on the ground with the winds and rain we had during the past week. The leaves were crunchy as I came down from the Stillwater Fire Tower last Sunday and the wind was still howling when I left up there. The rain that fell during the week wet things down some and we got a few showers from Thursday-to-Thursday night. We were out on Lake Clear trying to catch some of the migrating Loons, but we got no cooperation as the wind kept blowing well after dark. There was a Thunderstorm to the north while we were out there and some heavy showers to the south as I found large puddles along the highway in Long Lake on the way home. I got a half inch in my gauge here at the house.
The view out of my living room window is gray now with little color left. The beeches are still holding their leaves, but they are brown and many will hold on them most of the winter. The only ones that are still green are the oaks around the yard and soon they will turn a bright red.
My yard flowers are about to be gone. I still have some buds on the dahlias, and my monkey flower has just started to bloom. I may have to cut that and take it inside where it will keep blooming until all the flowers down the stem will bloom at each leaflet. I did this last year and they all came out; they are very pretty. Some out in the wild that will bloom sometimes even when covered with snow are the fringed gentians. They seem to have antifreeze in their buds as they fold up at night and open again in the morning when the sun shines. There are hundreds of these plants behind the dry hydrant between Inlet and Eagle Bay and down the ditch line toward Eagle Bay.
Now is the time to collect some milkweed seeds before they all blow away. After collecting them just scatter them in an undeveloped area of your property and you should have milkweed plants for the monarchs to feed on for several years. While up in the Fire Tower this Saturday, I had a monarch butterfly come up through the hatch and fly out the window. Later in the day I had one fly by the tower on its way westward.
When I got up there Saturday morning, I had lots of birds feeding around the tower. On the way up Blue Jays, Nuthatches and Woodpeckers were working on the nuts in the beeches. Up top outside the tower I had White and Red Breasted Nuthatches, Golden Crowned Kinglets, Black-capped Chickadees, Brown Tree Creepers, Blue Jays, Slate Colored Juncos, American Robin, Ravens, and Crows all snacking on the wild things around the tower. Three flocks of Canada Geese flew by during the morning before the people started arriving. Then there were nonstop people coming and going until I went down at four. I met ten more coming up as I went down bringing my total to ninety-nine people and three dogs, two which came up into the tower. One just a puppy and the other one a medium-size dog was carried up into the tower.
Down south Hurricane Isaias is the latest first Hurricane of the season in more than a century. Out west three hurricanes; Polo, Rachel and Simon all causing flooding and destruction when they came ashore and more inland flooding with rains of more than fifteen inches in some places. El-Nino is just stacking them up and now snows in the mountains at the tail end of these storms.
It is time to rap up both the flower and veggie gardens for winter but that’s another story. See ya.
Photo above: Last color from the tower
