We had gales and a lot of rain at the end of last week, which brought down most of the remaining leaves from our trees. Today there is a frost, so winter is snapping at autumn’s tail…

Hardly a leaf remains on the ash trees (Fagus sylvatica) at the back of the house - but lots of ash keys. That's the top of a silver birch bottom left of the picture...
I’m a firm believer in “If you can’t get out of it, get into it”, so decided to appreciate the autumn leaves as we swept them up into several big black sacks for the compost heap.

A mixture of fallen leaves in the front garden, blown up against a Cotoneaster hedge - those big dark brown leaves with white undersides are from a whitebeam
It always amazes me that we find leaves of tree species we don’t even have in the garden. I wonder how far they travel?

The last few leaves of Liquidambar still hang on to the tree despite the gales - click on the picture to go to my tribute to the Red Queen of the Fall
On this occasion, as well as the red Liquidambar styraciflua leaves that dominate the front lawn and the little rotting ash leaves (Fagus sylvatica) that fill the back yard, I saw whitebeam (Sorbus aria), oak (Quercus robur), silver birch (Betula pendula) and even a horse chestnut “leaflet” (Aesculus hippocastanum) and one or two linden (Tilia).

Those Liquidambar leaves get everywhere - this one is on the Euonymus, with Choisya ternata to the left
I’ve already tried to “explain” the colour changes of autumn leaves in my blog post The red leaves of autumn. Some leaves change colour and fall gracefully, some less so…

Fallen red leaves and tiny yellow Mahonia petals in the shade under the Japanese Acer dissectum atropurpureum
I’m not really one for poems, but I think this one by Scottish poet Elsie N Brady describes the season well…
Leaves
How silently they tumble down
And come to rest upon the ground
To lay a carpet, rich and rare,
Beneath the trees without a care,
Content to sleep, their work well done,
Colours gleaming in the sun.
At other times, they wildly fly
Until they nearly reach the sky.
Twisting, turning through the air
Till all the trees stand stark and bare.
Exhausted, drop to earth below
To wait, like children, for the snow.
Love the poem and I think fallen leaves are wonderful! I posted some on my blog yesterday š
Thanks for your support, Kerri š
And here’s the link to your leaves: http://thesunriseofmylife.blogspot.com
Morning Pat,
Very nice pics. Having no idea what “ash keys” are, I Googled them and, apparently, you can pickle them http://www.eatweeds.co.uk/pickled-ash-keys They don’t look too appetising, though . . .
Leaf-fall seemed to happen in the space of a couple of days here (Wirral), last week. Where I live, though urban, is heavily wooded, and some pavements are almost a foot deep in the things after the gales. Nobody seems to compost leaves any more, for some reason, even though, for a gardener, they’re a valuable resource. They don’t clear them either!
As for how far they can travel, I don’t have a definitive answer, but I know from my hillwalking/backpacking days that you can find dead leaves high on open moorland where there’s not a tree visible for miles.
We’ve finally had frost today, too – something of a novelty and a good month late, as seems to be becoming the norm.
Sorry I’m a bit late replying, but I worked Sunday and today is my day off for the week.
I was fascinated by that link to a recipe for pickled ash keys! Not sure I fancy that, as the ones we have are all muddy and trodden under foot…
I assume they are called keys because they hang in bunches, just like sycamore keys and some other tree seeds.
As I think I mentioned, we had our first frost on October 27. But we also had one yesterday and today, although surprisingly in between it rained overnight and we had fog. November certainly has plenty of interest.
Cheers…
Thanks for the beautiful pictures of fall and the lovely poem !
And thank you for the kind words…
Best wishes
x
Dear Pat – another lovely post! Thank you! We have so many of the same trees and plants here in Victoria BC Canada, and I’m sure if I visited Wales I would feel right at home! The poem was very sweet – so glad you included it!
Thanks so much for the kind words.
This has been a particularly colourful autumn in Wales and I’m sure you would be a welcome visitor – although I can’t claim you will see many sweetgums here – mine is the only Liquidambar I know! I guess they grow wild where you live…
Best wishes,
x
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