Though we do have some bare trees now all the warm weather we’ve had lately seems to be keeping a lot of the leaves on the trees. I thought I’d take a drive down one of our many country roads recently to see one of my favorite views of Mount Monadnock, and to see what the foliage was like there. The above photo shows what the road looked like and also shows that yes, I stopped to take photos. Luckily there isn’t much traffic on most of these back roads but even if there was we’re used to seeing people stopped on the side of the road with cameras at this time of year.
And oh, the things you see along these back roads. You really just have to stop sometimes and let yourself absorb the beauty of it all. This kind of magic isn’t something that we who live here take for granted; if you came here to see the foliage you would find that many of us locals would be standing right there beside you, and like you we’d be knocked speechless by the beauty of it all.
This view shows you what we were just driving through, with Mount Monadnock in the background. This is one of my favorite views of the mountain, but the bright sunshine made the foliage colors all look orange to me again.
I thought this red maple tree (Acer rubrum) was beautiful enough to have its own photo.
Maple trees can be any one of several colors including yellow, orange and red, and often once they have fallen they turn a beautiful deep purple. The leaves in this photo seemed to be heading towards yellow.
This is a view of the red maple trees along Route 101, which is a busy highway. Highway or back road it doesn’t matter, because you find this everywhere you go.
The sun chose a yellow leaved maple tree to spotlight and it looked like someone had thrown a great handful of yellow confetti out over the Ashuelot River. Sometimes you just have to say gosh, will you look at that. Hopefully you will have a camera in your hands when you do.
But isn’t it funny how the direction and intensity of the light can make a scene look so different? Like the previous photo this is a shot of the Ashuelot River in bright sunlight, but how very different the two scenes look. Photographers want to know these things so they can take them into account when taking a photo, but the path to that knowledge is usually strewn with many thousands of rejected photos. Of course it could be worse; that path could be strewn with rejected paintings.
This view from along the Ashuelot River shows how some maples have lost their leaves. Usually though, oak and beech trees start to turn and are at their peak just after the maples lose their leaves, so there is an unbroken line of color that can sometimes last a month. I think this year it will last more than a month.
Many of the leaves fall into the water and end up at the bottom of the river.
But while they float they’re still pretty.
On shore you might see the red / orange foliage of marsh St. Johnswort (Hypericum virginicum.) Many St. Johnsworts have a lot of red in them in their buds and seed pods, but I can’t think of another that I’ve seen with red leaves. Marsh St. Johnswort is also unusual because of its pink rather than yellow flowers.
Our hillsides still have good color but I’m seeing more bare trees on them too. When all the color on this hillside is gone it’s going to seem a very dramatic change.
Many of our bracken ferns (Pteridium) have turned to their flat, pinkish brown color but this one still glowed. I love to look at the many different patterns on ferns.
Oriental bittersweet berries (Celastrus orbiculatus) have a three part yellow outer shell that encloses the tomato red berry. Once the berries, each containing 3 to 6 seeds, are showing birds and small animals come along and snap them up, and that’s why this vining plant from China and Japan is so invasive. Its sale and planting are prohibited in New Hampshire but the berries make pretty Thanksgiving centerpieces, so many people go out and cut what they find in the wild before the holidays. This also helps the plant spread.
This year the record warmth is making the process go very slowly, but the burning bushes (Euonymus alatus) along the Ashuelot River in Swanzey are still changing to their pink / magenta color. Just before the leaves fall they’ll turn a soft, very pale pastel pink. The leaves on the trees above them seem to help regulate how quickly the burning bush leaves change color by keeping frost from touching them. In years when the overhanging branches lose their leaves early there is a good chance that the burning bushes will also lose theirs quickly. There have been years when I’ve seen hundreds of bushes all lose their leaves overnight.
The burning bushes might lose their leaves quickly some years but the berries will persist until birds have eaten every one of them. That’s what makes them one of the most invasive plants in the area and that is why, like Oriental bittersweet, their sale and cultivation have been banned in New Hampshire.
Just as beautiful but nowhere near as invasive are our native maple leaf viburnums (Viburnum acerifolium.) This one had the same pink as the burning bushes, but this small shrub can wear many colors, from orange to deep purple, and yellow to pale pink. I’m not sure if each one has the same colors year to year or if weather affects and changes their color each year.
You often get lucky and see two colors on maple viburnum leaves. I thought these purple and orange ones were absolutely beautiful with the beech leaves as a backdrop.
Few plants can outshine the beautiful deep purple of bittersweet nightshade (Solanum dulcamara.) This native of Europe and Asia is in the same family as potatoes and tomatoes and produces solanine, which is a narcotic, and the plant is considered toxic. It was used medicinally in medieval times, possibly as a dangerous sedative. In large enough doses solanine can paralyze the central nervous system.
The water was warm and the air cool one morning, and a gray mist rose from Half Moon Pond in Hancock. The light was also quite dim with the sun still behind the hills, so I was surprised that this photo came out at all. The time falls back an hour next weekend as daylight saving time ends. I’m not looking forward to it being dark at 5:00 pm, but I will be happy to see sunny mornings again.
Oak and beech trees are usually the last to change in this part of New Hampshire and they have just started changing. That means that the astounding colors found in the oak and beech forest that surrounds Willard Pond in Antrim should be just about at their peak and perfect now, so that’s where I’m headed today. Hopefully the next fall foliage post that you see on this blog will be from there, one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever seen in the fall.
Beauty is simply reality seen with the eyes of love. ~Anonymous
Thanks for stopping in.
I liked the way that you included both wide shots showing the scenery in total, and the close-up photos of the fabulous colors that you’re seeing this year! Several of these are worth framing, I lean towards the wider images myself, because I don’t see such scenes around here, but a few of the close-ups would also look good on the wall.
Thanks Jerry! It’s been a good year for fall foliage, extended because of the warmth.
That misty photo! What a special place. I would like to think that there won’t come a time when all these trees have been cut down.
Thank you Emily. We have many safeguards against that happening these days but we still do have a lot of forestry going on here. With 4.8 million acres of forest though, it’s hard to even see any change.
Beautiful photos, Allen! I so look forward to seeing your fall foliage posts; they never fail to please me. Our clocks went back last night so it is now dark as I type this comment! We also had gales and rain last night so the lanes are covered in leaves.
Thank you Clare. I’m hoping that I can get a couple of more foliage posts in before we see completely bare trees.
We’re supposed to have a lot of rain and 50 mph wind tomorrow, so that won’t help the foliage posts. I hope your winds weren’t destructive.
I don’t like to see it get dark so early but it’s so cloudy here right now that it might as well be dark.
It’s been like that here recently, though this evening is clear and cold for a change! Fortunately, there was no damage done last night and we even managed to keep our power on!
I hope we are as lucky as you were!
Me too!
I am pleased to find that the locals haven’t got tired of their beautiful surroundings.
I can’t see that ever happening. You’d have to be blind to be able to ignore it.
Fall foliage is something that always awes. It has been a long, drawn out season this year, but time is moving on and soon it will all over until next year. The oaks and beeches are coloring up here now.
Thank you Eliza. No, it can’t last forever and if it did we’d probably become bored by it. I saw some glorious beeches today!
Hey! Perfect timing! Just this morning my husband and I were walking on some Windmill Hill Association land over in Grafton, VT and I pointed out a low-growing, pale pink, maple-leaved shrub. The leaves were soft to the touch, peached, I’d call them. I couldn’t figure out what kind of tree it was. Then I read your post and discover it was likely a maple-leaved viburnum! How cool to have the wondering and the answer converge on the same day! Thanks!
You’re welcome Jennifer, glad I could help! Maple leaf viburnum is a beautiful shrub and I’m glad you found it. I saw many today too!
That Red Maple is fantastic!
It sure is. Just imagine millions more just like it.
You need to lobby for a garden fling in New England in October. You won’t see many flowers but you’ll see plenty of color!
Sounds like a good idea. Problem is someone has to organize it – it’s a totally volunteer effort.
Your autumn colors look beautiful, and I always love those photos of the reflections in the water.
We don’t get the vibrant colors here except for the blueberry bushes and snowball bushes which turn a beautiful scarlet.
Thank you Lavinia. It seems that many places don’t get the foliage colors that New England does, and that’s too bad. I always wonder if it’s because it can get so very cold here and doesn’t in many other places. Minnesota, Michigan and other upper Midwestern states have good color but they can also be very cold, so cold having an impact makes sense.
At least the blueberries and viburnums show off a bit in your area. The blueberries have been beautiful here this year too. I’d like to have more of them in my yard.
The annual summer drought may have some impact as well. If I am remembering correctly from my days back east, in dry years the autumn color in New England was not so good. In our area, where people have planted non-native maples there is good color, though. There must be some genetic component to the amounts of other pigments produced that are unmasked when the chlorophyll breaks down. I went looking and found a good reference here.
https://web.extension.illinois.edu/forestry/fall_colors.html
Our own native Big-Leaf Maple just turns yellow. I love the description of Big-Leaf Maple leaf fall I found on one site. “In fall, she holds her leaves rather like a handkerchief she’s done with and then drops them to the earth below”. The leaves can be as much as 1 ft across. Imagine a maple leaf that size in New England autumn colors!
Thank you for the link. I’ve read the same from various sources over the years. We had quite a drought last year but the trees were at their most colorful in a while. If we had a drought year after year though, I think it would be very different.
I’ve never seen a big leaf maple even on television, which seems a bit strange. It would be great if they turned red and orange as well as yellow!
They are a west coast species, found from southern Alaska down to southern California. A small pocket has been found in Idaho, but not further east than that. They are impressive, especially the older ones covered in mosses and ferns. These big old trees are sometimes victims of poaching.
http://nwnewsnetwork.org/post/music-wood-poaching-case-targets-mill-owner-who-sold-prs-guitars
It’s a beautiful tree with wood like I’ve never seen. It’s too bad they can’t be grown commercially so native trees weren’t cut, but I’d guess that they probably need very special moisture and temperature conditions.
The U.S. Forest Service has a good page on the growth requirements for this species, and also has a photo of a human hand in comparison to a leaf.
https://www.fs.fed.us/database/feis/plants/tree/acemac/all.html
Wow, that’s big!
Very, very beautiful. So glad this loveliness is not taken for granted.
Thank you Laurie. I’ve seen many old timers gawking at the foliage just like the tourists do, so I don’t think anyone will ever take it for granted. I certainly don’t!
To gawk and appreciate beauty is a fine thing.
Yes, I hope more people will give it a try.
Oh my! How lovey. Thank you for all the times you introduce me to the plants I’ve seen and not known before. And you are right. We do stop with the tourists to admire the beauty. The leaves on the road to my house have gone from flaming reds, orange, and yellow to bronze and gold. A grove of silver barked beeches with leaves of brilliant gold always makes me think that there should be a dragon guarding this hoard of beauty. Thanks for sharing your “hoard”.
You’re welcome Carol, and thank you. It sounds like you live in a beautiful place!
I’m really beginning to enjoy reading your blog, while enjoying my morning coffee!! As of yesterday, the colors are still very vibrant along the rail trail in Keene off from Eastern Avenue to Water Street. But I’m thinking that with the weather that is coming tomorrow into Monday, that will all change, and those leaves will be decorating the ground. With that, I think I’ll go out and snap a few pictures….thank you for the inspiration!!!
Thank you David. I haven’t been on that trail since last year but I think I remember a lot of sumac and birch out there, which should be good and colorful. You’re right about the coming rain and wind. They say we might see gusts of 50 mph, so that will strip a lot of the leaves off the trees. Soon beech and oaks will be the only trees left with color and if this fog ever lifts I’m going to go see some. Have fun on the rail trail!
You have some colors we just don’t see hear!
I think I remember you saying you don’t have many maples in Ohio, and in this post that’s where most of the colors come from. They’re a very beautiful tree, especially the red maples.
Gorgeous!
I hope You’re having the same kind of autumn in Canada that we’re having here. It’s been beautiful this year.
Thanks for inspiring a destination on this October Saturday. With beauty everywhere, a sort of overwhelmed confusion can set in. And no matter the season, Willard Pond and the surrounding hills never disappoints.
You’re welcome Lynne, you might see me there. I keep telling myself I’m going to visit Willard Pond at other times of year but so far I’ve only seen it in the fall. It sure hasn’t disappointed me yet. It’s a very beautiful place!
What a treat, thank you so much for documenting all those wonderful colours, I particularly enjoyed the reflections.
You’re welcome Susan, and thank you. Sometimes the wind is still enough to show good reflections. I’m hoping it’s that way today.