Saying farewell to summer

It’s mid-September ... late summer is sliding toward early autumn. The end of summer officially arrives with the autumnal equinox of Sept. 23, when the sun crosses the celestial equator going north to south.

One senses this transition in the cool mist-shrouded mornings as well as by the brown-splotched and red-tinged leaves of the buckeye trees. Communal groups of swallows will soon be gathering on wires and branches prior to their annual southerly migration. Before long, monarch butterflies will be skipping with ease along the Appalachian chain headed for their ancestral wintering grounds in Mexico.

Walnut toxicity

The walnut trees along the creek where we live are exhibiting a bumper crop this year. At night we are starting to hear their fruits dropping with heavy thuds on the ground or like depth charges into the water. Hopefully, one of them won’t conk me on the head when I’m working in the yard.

Enchanting the summer evening

No late summer wildflower is more widely recognized than evening primrose. The four broad yellow petals that open in the evening and often linger into mid-morning on overcast days are a dead giveaway. If you’re looking for the plant, you won’t have to venture any farther than the first disturbed area in your neighborhood.

Remarkable red cedar

I sometimes have occasion to drive Interstate 81 up the Great Valley of Tennessee and Virginia to Washington, D.C. As soon as I pass out of Western North Carolina into the terrain north of Knoxville, the dominant tree along the roadside becomes red cedar. Spread throughout abandoned fields and clinging to the narrow ledges of rock outcrops, they flicker like green torches for hundreds of miles. I can never get enough of limestone country or the stands of red cedar that flourish there. And I never cease to wonder at the variety of shapes the tree can display within a short distance.

Ginkgo — a living fossil

When a street was being cut in front of the new county administration building here in Bryson City back in the 1980s, a large foreign-looking tree could well have been felled in the name of progress. But resident R.P. Jenkins convinced authorities to pave a sidewalk around the tree so that it still stands at the corner of Mitchell and Everett streets as a representative of what has been rightfully called “a living fossil.”

Hollyhocks and reminders of the past

Sometimes it’s difficult to draw the line between the natural and cultivated plant worlds. As cultivated plants escape they often establish themselves as part of our regional flora. My wife, Elizabeth, and I are particularly fond of those old-fashioned garden flowers that persist about abandoned homesteads. Sometimes the only evidence of former habitation will be the mute testimony offered by the gray foundation stones of the cabin and a scattered array of old-fashioned garden flowers.

Sicklefin redhorse and the Cherokee

An article by Jon Ostendorff headed “Rare fish released into Oconaluftee River” appeared in this past Monday’s edition of the Asheville Citizen-Times. It caught my eye because of an ongoing general interest in the fish found in Western North Carolina waters as well as a particular interest in the methods utilized by the ancient Cherokees to capture and process them as a food source.

Thunder in the valley

Last week a late evening thunderstorm with high winds and occasional flashes of lightning rolled out of the high Smokies and down into the little valley where we live several miles west of Bryson City. I had sensed its arrival for 10 or so minutes. First, a cool breeze kicked up that exposed the silvery undersides of leaves on trees surrounding our house. Next, the light in the valley became yellowish-greenish, almost luminescent. A few outsized raindrops began to splatter on our tin roof and wooden decks. Finally, the rain poured in a torrent that lasted for perhaps half an hour.

Weed or wildflower?

The status of a given plant as either a “noxious weed” or a “lovely wildflower” is pretty much a matter determined in the mind’s eye of the beholder. Several weeks ago, in a column headed “Persecution of the Dandelion,” I defended that plant against the plethora of TV lawn care commercials calling for its eradication. I was startled by the number of emails I received that supported my sentiments.

Just looking around

I’m rediscovering that it’s good to just slip out of the office and amble around town for a few minutes. The semi-urban landscape here in Bryson City — or any of the other little mountain towns — provides an interesting admixture of human endeavors with a teeming population of wildlife and plants that have adapted to our ways. And even if you don’t spot any interesting plants or animals, the walk will do you good.

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