SIGNS OF THE TIMES, AND BEARS AT WORK

HAZELNUT...NEXT SPRING'S STAMINATE CATKINS

HIGH BUSH CRANBERRIES RIPENING

MOUNTAIN ASH BERRIES RIPENING

RED OAK ACORNS RIPENING

Tuesday,  8:15 AM.  69 degrees F, wind SW, light.  The sky is overcast and it has rained a bit.  The humidity is 90% and the barometer is steady, at 29.82".  Not a good day to cut firewood, but my desk is littered with projects.  A bear is roaming the neighborhood again, and turned over a dumpster a block up the street.

   My plans to cut firewood yesterday came to naught; it took  the morning  to get a flat tire on the truck fixed, and it ended up raining much of the day as well.  The flat tire was the result of a puncture by a sharp stone.  Have to be careful driving the backwoods roads.  Meanwhile, the signs of seasonal change are everywhere.

   If you can find a hazelnut bush, take a close look at the young  branches and you will see delicate little rod-like structures in the axils of the leaves (where the leaf joins the stem).  These are the staminate catkins, which will overwinter and develop in the spring to provide the pollen which fertilizes the minute scale-like flowers that will produce the hazel nut. Those pictured are of the native beaked hazel, Corylus cornuta.

   The high bush cranberry, Viburnum americium, berries are changing from yellow and orange to red quickly now, as are the mountain ash berries.  We have at least three species of mountain ash present in our area, the American, the European, and the showy mountain ash. The later has deep red berries, the first two orange berries.  It's probably worth doing a more  in depth discussion of the genus Sorbus in a future blog.

   The red oaks, Quercus rubra, are now dropping their ripe acorns.  Those pictured look really well developed and there should be a bountiful crop this year, which is very important for squirrels, grouse, turkeys and deer.

   The whole Syria situation is such a bungled, confusing mess that I have said little about it, but I find it absolutely amazing that Obama's nemesis Putin has thrown him a political lifeline, offering to persuade Syria's Assad to put his chemical weapons under some sort of international control.  The President has evidently now jumped at this idea, which he just the other day called impossible to accomplish.  
  I haven't heard any of the pundits pose the following question, so I shall:  what will Putin demand in return, or what has he been offered, for this very timely rescue?  And what will we end up paying the Russian bear?

CAUTION, BEAR AT WORK