St Croix River Road Ramblings

Welcome to River Road Ramblings.

Sunday, September 21, 2014

Maples are Spectacular this Year

Sugar maples are red and orange this year along with some yellows.  Many years they are just yellow. 


Thou blossom bright with autumn dew,
And colored with the heaven's own blue,
That openest when the quiet light
Succeeds the keen and frosty night.
William Cullen Bryant  (He wrote this about the fringed gentian, a cousin to the bottle gentian here that never opens) 

Brother Marv's River Road field -- little and big Bluestem prairie grass.  The sand barrens were prairie in the pre-settlement days. The prairie grasses come back given a chance.  Marv did not seed this, it is just naturally occurring.  

Margo's seed geraniums, planted in February, are hanging in there even though the deer want to eat off the blooms. 


The old cow pasture has grown up to partridge berry in the lowlands.  A bear hangs out in these thickets with two cubs. 

Enough rain came in August to fill the woodland ponds for winter. The frogs should be happy for winter quarters that are water rather than mud. 

Sumac is coloring.  Sumac clumps spread out almost like topiary sculptures as the young plants blend into the tall ones in the middle.  Just north of the Farm behind Bass Lake