Leaves

Leaves.08 Earl Plato

With the colouring of leaves in Fall comes the inevitable. They fall off. The sequence of the falling of the leaves is like the sequence of the blooming of our Spring wildflowers. It repeats itself each year. Look around the neighbourhood at the leaf bearing trees. The time of their leaf-fall is a characteristic of the individual tree. Across the way from us a Black maple hangs on to its leaves long after other maples have shed theirs. I walk through many nature settings this time of year. I strolled the Friendship Trail east of Prospect Point Road in early October. What I saw first was the downdrift on that calm day of elongated leaves with delicate tints of yellow, salmon and yes, purple. They were leaves of the white ash. Now in late October we see the descent of the crimson of the red maples, the gold of the hickories, the pale yellow of the beech. From now on the woodland scene is spreading out. Elaine pointed to a black walnut tree almost devoid of leaves, “There’s a squirrel nest we hadn’t seen before.” We will learn progressively something new as we see revealed what the dense foliage of summer has hidden. Take a walk and look around for something uncovered by the falling of leaves. Enjoy the great outdoors.
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We were at the CN Tower just before the power failure at Skydome in Toronto in late August. We were mulling around Canadiana souvenir displays. There they were - great prints of moose in a Canadian wilderness setting. I already have twelve large and small moose paintings and shots on my one wall. One more? Elaine said, “Do you really need it?” Enough said. I have one more article this year about moose. I learned from the Algonquin Park publication, the Raven, some new things about my favourite big animal. Here’s one: Moose often come out to Ontario’s highways in spring. This past early June Elaine and I saw two of the huge beasts both on the highway or next to it. I am told that contrary to the widespread public myth, this is NOT because they are trying to escape biting insects particularly black and deer flies. What! The waiter back at our lodge had told us so. They come instead
to drink the slightly salty water left in the roadside ditches after winter sanding/salting operations. Of course flies will follow the moose and in our case humans onto highways just as readily as anywhere else.