Those stupid trees (11/21/2019)

It has been blowing like crazy this past weekend. There is a coastal storm offshore, and it is whipping up the wind to occasional speeds of 50 miles per hour or for you metric folks close to 80 km per hour. We could hear it howl around the house. Since it is mid-November there are a lot of fall leaves on the ground and they are blowing all over the place. It is interesting to see how we had a ridge of leaves at the leeward side of my car. When we left to go to a social at church in the morning it was there, when we came back it was gone, blown away. However, three hours later in the afternoon the ridge had returned.

Since it is mid-November, you think it would be an opportune time for all the deciduous trees to release their leaves with such a strong wind like this and set them free. But no, or better hell no. It is like they did not realize that in two weeks from now they will be doing this anyway, so why not now? Usually, at least all the past 19 years that I lived here; the trees have lost all their leaves by the end of November, if not the first week of December. We already had a good (early) frost, which also seems to be a signal to many of these trees that it is time. But hell no! They are not letting go. If they would drop the leaves, at least then all those leaves would fly to my neighbor and I would not have to deal with them. My neighbor on the side where the wind comes from does not have any trees, so I would be safe from that side. But now it means that I will have to deal with them after Thanksgiving. 

We have a lot of trees in our neighborhood. In the past I have written and complained how the folks in my subdivision build whole fortifications of leaves along the road <here>. They bag their leaves and then stack them three bags high along the road, somewhat in a display of “I can stack them higher than you” or “I can hide my house better than you.” These folks are mining nutrients out of their soil and sending to the landfill. Instead, they should be composting the leaves or at least grinding them up with a mulching mower. Moreover, I have also mentioned in my blog that last year in December we were out in our back yard at night with our headlights admiring all the small moving lights in the fallen leaves. It appeared these lights were reflections of our headlights in the eyes of minute spiders, it was absolutely magical. There seems to be so much life in those dead fallen leaves and that explains why all those birds in my back-yard hunt through them. Then to think that my neighbors haul them off to the dump. On the other hand, one of the advantages of all the piling along the road is that my male dog has something new to mark when we go for our daily walks. 

So, what is the possible reason for the trees to hold on to the leaves through this storm? One reason I think is our dry September and October; we did not have any rain for six weeks. Based on the ephemeral ponds behind our home, the groundwater levels are still very low; I would say at least 6 feet or more deep, while sometimes by now, it should be just a foot or two below the ground surface. Would it be that the drought we experienced caused this unusually late season? Is it caused by global warning? I don’t know, but all I know or remember from what I learned is that in some species the change in colors and leaf drop is caused by the change in day length or better night length. Here I am thinking about maples which usually start changing color by the end of September when the day and night length are equal. One thing we have noticed is that one of the maples in our yard that we have a love hate relationship with is finally coloring. This is almost a month later than normal. Our love of the tree is its bright yellow color in fall. Our hate for the tree is the sheer size, the fact that is seems to push out other plants and that it appears to lean in a direction that concerns us somewhat. In other words, we are watching it like a hawk. This tree is supposed to be empty by now, but no it is not. So, what the heck? 

Our maple is finally yellow.  As I mention it is approximately one month later than normal and I can only speculate that climate change and the drought this fall has something to do with it.

All that I can think is that nature this fall is all screwed up, and if you ask me this may be a sign of things to come. In this post, I will not explain how nature is supposed to act. However, nature does seem to be somewhat out of whack. I really wonder where things are going to end up, but I expect it is not going to be pretty. One thing I know, those darn trees are telling us something: climate change is accelerating, and I am not sure if we can turn it back.