Equinox

The season is turning. A few weeks ago, a fresh layer of dropped leaves on the urban forest floor caught me by surprise -- most of them were still green.
 

It had been rather windy... but did the bigleaf maples care about the greenness they had yet to take back?

 

Some of that green is wanted by someone; they munched out the tasty softer bits between the veins of this red alder leaf.

 

Just a few days later, actual canopy color change seemed to hit the maples all at once.

While many things expanded to huge this summer season, not everything reached its full potential. As I began preparing a long neglected summer garden for its next season, this tiny cucumber was discovered beneath larger leaves.

After windy woods

Went for a walk a few days ago after a windy night in the urban forest.

Lots of material had been shook loose from the canopy. Including this nest:

Ivy is showing its winter colors.

While licorice fern stays a light green.

 

The sun shines briefly but brightly through the cold, open canopy.

So, this is my first attempt to layer a short exposure over a long exposure to create an image with more depth. It's just slightly unaligned.

Urban Wildlife - an exciting encounter

Enormous Mantis @ the PSU Community Garden!

Pea Beetles

I've been saving my pea seeds for several years, and never had a problem with bugs. This year though, I opened my seed packet just to take a look and found each with a round hole.

And a lot of little beetles, curled up inside of a pea or trying to escape from the packet.