I took stock of the deciduous trees while crunching through yesterday’s lovely leaf-strewn morning walk. The ash, maple and aspen trees are for the most part taking their rest now and the tamaracks aren’t far behind. Many others are still mostly green but are inevitably tilting toward yellow.
These are cottonwoods.
While living in southern Alberta I grew to appreciate the cottonwoods a lot. They thrive there and provide many advantages to humans, birds and animals alike. On the prairies they drop their leaves much earlier, so it’s lovely to see them wearing their summer garb well into November.
In the last couple of weeks I’ve noticed that sometimes, my “likes” on some posts are disappearing. If I go back to “like” a second or even a third time, it will drop again a few minutes later. It then appears as if I haven’t clicked “like” at all.
This is extremely irritating as you can imagine, especially when you’re trying to let people know you appreciate what they have posted.
Autumn apples – better than WP issues.
In the time it has taken for me to write this short bit, the likes I have left on others’ posts have dropped or disappeared, specifically from Renard, Mr. Muse and Travels Through My Lens. So if you haven’t seen my likes show up, it’s not for lack of trying. It’s because there’s some sort of WP glitch going on.
Halloween, or All Hallows Eve, in its original form is an ancient Celtic religious celebration that welcomed the harvest. People feasted and partied and in order to cautiously ward off ghosts, they lit bonfires and wore costumes to scare them away.
The advent of Christianity meant that elements of the ancient harvest festival were frowned on and the early church decided to incorporate it into the new November 1 All Saints Day, which was meant to eventually replace Samhain.
But things got a little muddled. “Halloween” is derived from All Hallows Eve, the name given to the evening before November 1, which is when Christians are to recognise and venerate the hallowed or consecrated and holy saints. Except things didn’t completely go that way.
The Samhain traditions remained largely untouched, regardless of Pope Gregory’s long-ago efforts back in AD 1000 to replace the celebration with a Christian one.
Most people don’t realise that the name “Halloween” is the shortened form of a Christian religious observance meant to overtake and eventually remove the old Samhain beliefs and practises, but Samhain lives on and the religious importance of November 1 has often been forgotten.
Red barberry is a relatively low-lying and dense shrub that has red edible fruit and green leaves that turn a brilliant crimson in autumn. I have often admired these bushes …
… until I did a little research and learned that they are an invasive species that has caused some rather serious issues.
Because they have a thick, dense thatch, they attract ticks; research indicates that this plant, more than any other, has caused the spread of Lyme disease. These bushes are also responsible for changes in soil nitrogen which in turn leads to a decline in native species.
Although they look beautiful and I love their autumn dress, they are banned in many areas – particularly because of tick infestations – and unfortunately should probably be eliminated wherever they are found.
Penticton sits between two lakes: Okanagan Lake at the north end and Skaha Lake at the south end.
Okanagan Lake in October.
Okanagan Lake is the much larger one; it’s 135 km (84 miles) long, from 4 to 5 kilometres (two to three miles) wide, and is as much as 230 metres (760 ft) deep in some spots. Technically, it is a fjord lake as it was created through glaciation.
An evening Okanagan Lake in mid-September.
For many years Okanagan Lake has been a hub of recreation, transportation, sustenance and employment; its 10,000 year cultural importance to the Syilx/Okanagan Nation cannot be overstated.
A moody Skaha Lake.
Penticton is built on the result of an ancient landslide that split Okanagan Lake into two, with the smaller one in the south becoming known as Skaha in Okanagan or horse lake in English.
Skaha Lake in early October.
Skaha Lake is 12 kilometres (seven miles) long and two to three kilometres (two miles) wide. Its average depth is 27 metres (87 ft), making it ideal for canoeing, swimming, dragonboating, windsurfing, kite surfing and sailing, and especially for learning these activities.
Skaha Lake in late June haze.
This relatively shallow lake warms up in the spring and summer and by August is like a big bathtub. It retains this heat well into October; we saw people swimming last week before the arrival of this week’s cold snap.
Much recreational life revolves around these lakes, even if only to sit on one of the beaches to relax or just to enjoy the view.
They are everywhere and in huge numbers, swirling and crunching.
I love this colourful ground detritus, a profuse panoply of underfoot leaves that bring a smile in the weather that’s beginning to turn a bit colder now.
It’s a lovely golden, red, orange and yellow mess that’s completely environmentally safe.
But good-bye summer; as we start to experience more invigorating temperatures, we’re looking forward to seeing you again soon.
The autumn reds are beginning to come into their own. During a break between rain showers, I stopped to take a few pictures of this arresting tribute to the season’s beauty.
This “winged euonymus” or “burning bush” is turning a brilliant colour.
This particular bush was of interest to me since about four or five days ago, it hadn’t started to change at all.
It won’t be long before it is entirely afire and likely causes others to stop and admire, a good thing in our busy world.
The rain continues with overcast skies punctuated by short sunny breaks and quite a lot of wind! Autumn has definitely blown in.
It’s still very comfortable outside but the cooler temperatures are nice even if the wind tries to steal your shirt! There will likely be a few more completely lovely days before autumn’s invigorating coolness and stunning colours start arriving.
With the many harvest and wine festivals at this time of year, we have been visiting some of the more obscure and smaller wineries in the southern Okanagan Valley between Oliver and Osoyoos. This area is only 35 km (22 miles) to the south of us from Penticton.
The area is classified as semi-arid desert and the summer temperatures regularly climb into the low 40s (105-107F). Much of the valley is irrigated with water from nearby valley and mountain lakes and this allows a rich diversity of fruit and vegetables to grow, especially wine grapes.
This combination of dry heat and soil moisture causes the flavours of the wine grapes to be very concentrated which can produce some excellent reds.
It’s also good rosé country. Rosé results from some contact with the red grape skins to give it the distinctive hues that range all the way from light pink to orange to a light red.
This is not only good wine country. Opportunities for outdoor activities such as cycling, camping, swimming, boating, rock climbing and hiking are plentiful and varied. There are lots of good restaurants, and if you love fresh fruit and veggies, this might be your nirvana.
I saw this deer across the street as I was leaving home.
He seemed to have found some yummy leaves and was intent on chowing down. Normally I cross the road to where the deer is standing, but I didn’t want to bother him.
With the drought and fires this season, the animals have had a tough time of it and more and more are entering urban areas to find food. This includes an uptick in the number of bears coming into people’s yards, as shown in the recent photos below from Quesnel, British Columbia; the entire article is here.
Photo by Julie Dorge Photography
This is a grizzly bear. Black bears are more commonly found in urban areas but grizzlies are different. They dislike and avoid humans, so this tells me that they are being driven by hunger.
Photo by Julie Dorge Photography
This underweight grizzly is pulling crabapples from a tree in a residential yard. Given the difficult summer they’ve had, we will likely begin to see more of them trying to fatten up for hibernation and will need to be cautious.
In the Net! - Pictures and Stories of Life 