Just when you think you can’t take the summer heat one moment longer, it’s fall. Momma always said fall was her most favorite season.
As a child, summer was best. Why, you’re out of school and able to play neighborhood games well into dark, there’s family beach vacations, swimming in the backyard plastic pool and picnics at the park; but now that I’m older it’s the transitional seasons I enjoy most.
I like being eased into winter. Surprise and adventure are highly overrated these days. Waking to a sunrise or seeing the moon in its fullness, or plucking a pear from a neighbor’s tree, even spotting a young buck at midday meandering at the lake’s edge is thrilling enough.
Fall afternoons are still comfortably warm. An occasional cool breeze comes out of nowhere as the sun sinks below the tree line. It’s no longer so hot that gardening is out of the question. The petunias of summer are having their last hoorah; the fall chrysanthemums are starting to bud. I’m considering planting dusty miller in flower boxes, as it did well through the bitterest of last year’s winter.
Down the road farmers are baling hay into large, round bales. Some Octobers I’ve seen where the end of a hay bale is spray-painted orange, then the face of a jack-o-lantern is added.
Sam shared about seeing animal shapes made from such hay bales across the landscape of south Alabama. Somehow I prefer the natural splendor of rolling Prairie land dotted by undecorated hay bales.
In my mind’s eye I’ve noted the location of persimmon trees between woods and field. The deer will be coming for the ripened fruit soon. No doubt they are smart enough to wait ’til the fruit is sweetened, and if not, they surely will learn. Everyone who has ever partaken of a wild persimmon has no doubt learned the hard way to wait.
The cotton fields are ready for harvest. A careful observer will notice the right-of-ways of Highway 45 South, Columbus to Macon, are littered with bits and pieces of harvested cotton. It’s a good sign and, as Daddy would say, “The smell of money.”
Our greenhouse is cleared of the vestiges of summer plants. Enriching conditioners are being added to the soil. I’m making selections for winter planting. Chard does well, as do kale and parsley, basil and cilantro, providing a gourmet diet for the pet rabbits.
Flower pots are emptied and stacked, ready to make room for overwintering summer plants: blue daze, geranium, impatiens, Mexican heather, millionbells, oriental sweet potatoes, petunias, salvia, amaryllis, some Swedish ivy and bougainvillea.
Felder Rushing’s “Magnolia Almanac” says it’s not too late to plant mustard greens, spinach, turnips, leaf lettuces and garlic. It’s also a good time to work on a compost pile. All winter long the pile should be turned. Be sure to mulch up leaves before you add them. They always forget to tell you that.
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