October in Photos

   
     October was a struggle between two weather patterns that brought us some pretty strange moments. It was not the usual warm days and frosty nights but rather a continuation of Pacific moisture that brought us fog and snow! In fact Thanksgiving was unprecedented for the cold weather, just a few degrees above freezing, the local meteorologists had to look several decades into the past to find one nearly as cold in the records. So I missed my very favourite time of year with leaf changing colour mostly because a lot of leaves will not change after prolonged cold, however, by the end of the month we were seeing temperatures quite above normal so I could get in a few hundred spring bulbs! This is likely the last of monthly round ups as our growing season has ended, from now until March it is pretty much winter. I do hope to write a few articles over the winter though so stay tuned! Until next spring enjoy October in photos!

I spotted these wild asparagus in my local park. apparently they do very well in our climate and can naturalize easily. I don't recall them turning such a brilliant yellow but with strange weather we often get strange results with plants. I thought these asparagus were quite something with their fine foliage!

This is either a Choke Cherry or Mayday or some such genus, either way I thought the orange was really outstanding.

This Hawthorn turned a deep shade of red like many kinds of trees in the apple family.

Even through the cold and snow these Mountain Ash maintained a good show through October, they are some of the last trees to lose their leaves and among the few that turn red.

The snow seemed to fall for days on end, however, the ground is still warm so most of it melts quite quickly and although it looks cold it's often not cold enough to damage plants too much, it's more of a weighing branches down issue.

Fog is a little unusual around these parts so when it goes on for a few days it starts to feel like we're back on the West Coast! It's interesting for a while but after many days of cloud and fog and snow it begins to weigh on the soul.

I'm glad I got these Ornamental Kale this year as it has turned out to actually be a very mild late fall and I still have them outside right now in the second week of November! I did move them inside the house during our snowy period though, they may have survived the temperatures but the snow may have been damaging in other ways. And who doesn't want half a dozen plants and planters in their living room for the holiday!?!?

I've had these Italian Asters for years and I've seen them shrug off -10C and heavy wet snow, blooming happily away well into November!