Harvest

Home Sweet Home, as summer ends and autumn is just days away.

Sept 16, 2018

It was just one week ago that I tried one of the apples from my tree and surmised that it was very nearly ripe. I'd supposed, wrongly, that I had a few weeks left until it was time to pull the young apples off the tree. Then, five days later, I walked out in the yard and discovered dozens of apples lying on the ground all around the trunk, some already turning brown and others covered with industrious, tiny ants. The time to harvest was now.

Some apples just couldn't wait to be picked, so they jumped ship.

So Sarah and Chris came over a little bit early yesterday, before our weekly family dinner, and helped me pick as many of the apples as we could reach. Actually, they did most of the work. I got the lower branches, but then I got busy with my camera and left the rest to them. Our neighbor, Gary, was watering his front lawn while we worked, and he kindly loaned us an apple-picker for the higher branches. I didn't even know such a tool existed!

Chris goes after the apples in the upper branches.

Chris got out my ladder and worked on getting the apples in the upper branches, which was quite a job. Sarah took the apples from him and loaded them into the ice chest, as well as picking up any off the ground that seemed unbruised and unafflicted by insects. The next chore will be to wash the apples and place them in the refrigerator drawer, where they should keep for four to six weeks. Or three to four weeks for those that are russeted. However, since we're heading out of town again in a few days, I hope I can get them washed, air-dried, and into the fridge before we get on the road. There's so much to do!

Bounty enough to fill the bottom of the ice chest with tiny apples.

The next question is this: What am I going to do with them?

During the week following Labor Day, there was a little chill in the air, especially in the mornings and evenings. Everyone started waxing poetic about fall and daydreaming longingly of Halloween and Thanksgiving and sweaters and a blaze in the fireplace. But this week we had another little heatwave, with highs in the upper-80s and lows only in the mid-50s. Maybe we'll get that chill back next week and autumn will begin in earnest. Our annual Fall Festival is less than two weeks away!

Gary's tree next-door is already starting to get its fall foliage.

Meanwhile, my trees are holding onto their green leaves (although one of our neighbor's trees now has some patches of gold). It's always hard for me to imagine that, within a couple of months, the branches will be bare, and the lovely, cool greenery will be only a memory.

A canopy of green, viewed from beneath two large oaks at the side of my house.

Sept 10, 2018

Living in an evergreen ecosystem as we do, you wouldn't think the changing of the leaves would be such a huge deal, but we do have enough oaks and aspens and other deciduous trees to allow some yellow, gold, and brown to adorn our trees before the winter winds carry them away. While we don't get the vibrant oranges and reds seen in New England, there's still enough change to inspire visitors to drive to our community every fall so they can enjoy the crispy weather and the colorful leaves.

Then we get out the rakes. And not just for the fallen leaves! Sadly, evergreens may be ever green, but they do lose their needles. In massive quantities. In fact, we had some strong winds this week that left my yard covered in a carpet of pine needles, and it will only get deeper over the coming month.

These two pines in the driveway have a lot of dead branches.

The cleanup will include more than just leaves and pine needles. During some of our worst monsoon storms this summer, heavy winds tore a lot of the dead branches from the pines in my yard, especially two that stand in the middle of my driveway. Last November, when the men from church came to put on my new metal roof, a few took time to trim away most of the lower dead branches. Someday, though, I'll need to hire a professional to remove the dead branches that hang dangerously high above the ground.

Some of those dead branches were removed by Mother Nature.

Meanwhile, after a powerful microburst exploded above downtown Lakeside in July and ripped several giant pine trees out of the ground and tossed them across the roads like kindling, I'll just be grateful that all we have to deal with are some broken branches!

July 27, 2018: Tall pines block Niels Hansen Lane.

(I was on my way to the post office, one block away.)

Another giant pine blocks Church Lane after the microburst.

This enormous root system was ripped right out of the ground.