Saturday, December 12, 2015

STRIPPED DOWN FOR WINTER

It doesn't really make sense to me.

You would think as the weather gets colder the trees would want all of their leaves to surround them.

But instead they remove all of their protection from icy temperatures and snow.

For example, you remember that big red maple in our front yard?

Here's how it looked this morning.


I suppose the one advantage is it gives us a little easier view out toward the town and the mountains in the distance.


The sycamore with its huge leaves is nearly as equally bereft of foliage.


The ash tree is the last to release it's clutter.


And clutter it is.

In spite of raking up four big bags of leaves only a week ago it looks like another day of yard labor awaits us.


So it goes.

8 comments:

  1. Our leaves have all fallen and the ones I didn't rake were blown away by the wind. Thank you wind.

    Steve

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  2. We don't need the shade this time of year. Too wet to rake!

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  3. The oaks in California are somehow programmed to stay green and shed the brown leaves and acorns simultaneously. Yesterday I blew leaves off the walks and patios. A band of rain and hail (first I've seen in almost 10 years) came through when the weather settled down I had to do it again. We have windrows of acorns. The old(er) guy across the road says that's a sign of a hard winter. Hard in SoCal means 60's in the daytime, low 40's/high 30's at night.

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  4. Your scenes look winterish to be sure. We have some deciduous trees here on the Central Coast and they drop leaves, but the pine, chaparral and scrub stay green. The sun also does not do such a disappearing act. Plus the grape vines turn autumn color too.

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  5. I guess leaves don't provide warmth for the tree and aren't necessary during the winter.

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  6. I always figured it kept them from being pulled down by high winds, ice and snow, that would accumulate on the leaves. Like stripping down to swim, heavy clothes would become burdensome and not keep a body any warmer.

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  7. We lost our leaves in Sept, and there has been a snow cover for weeks. Your state of fall/winter is long past here.

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  8. I don;t miss raking. It is done for us in our townhouse. I wish they would wait before 8am to start the leaf blowers though.

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