The fungus among us

I took the opportunity to take a walk in the woods on our property and down along a stream that passes through the east end.

There aren't any flowers to photograph this time of year, but I did find some interesting fungus that had sprung up in the fairly wet weather that we have had in the past few weeks.

This toadstool was popped up our of the leaves on the forest floor.

I saw several of these small white mushrooms with some speckles on top.  These were about an inch-and-a-half high.

These are some of those same mushrooms pushing up through some leaves.

This fungus was growing out of the side of an old sugar maple tree that had fallen across the stream.

Another of the same type of fungus, this one taken without a flash.  Some Virginia creeper grows down behind it.

Another type of fungus growing out of the same log.

Fall is here

It's been quite a while since I have posted.  We've been busy with various things.  Fall has been arriving around us.  I have taken the honey off of the hives and extracted about 115 pounds of honey.  Most of it is in two buckets -- about 10 gallons of it--waiting to be bottled.  The garden has been giving up the last of its harvest.  Near freezing temperatures are predicted for next week which will finish off most of the garden.

The trees are starting to show some color across this filed of soybeans ready to be harvested.  This field has since been harvested and is standing empty as of a few days ago.

Here is the soybean field from the east end next to the garden, looking into the sunset.

The sugar maple tree in the front yard is showing lots of fall color.

The Enterprise apple tree should be just ripening up now and both trees have quite a few apples.

The Golden Delicious apple trees are fully ripe and perhaps over- ripe now  I have picked a sack full to make a pie, but haven't made it yet.

The Red Delicious trees are full of large ripe apples and dropping many on the ground that are becoming covered in wasps and bees after the sweet juice.

Red delicious apples on branches that are hanging down heavy with ripe apples.

The tomatoes are about finished and will be killed by frost next week.  I left a lot of ripe fruit on the plants in the past month because we just weren't able to keep up with it.

Here is a cart load of pumpkins and a couple watermelons that we picked weekend before last.  We also picked a couple of large bags of ornamental gourds.

Here is a cart load of produce that I picked tonight -- pumpkins, eggplants, tomatoes, watermelons, birdhouse gourds, apples and a few ornamental gourds.  This is probably about the last of the produce we will get, other than some more birdhouse gourds and some potatoes.

I gathered this five gallon bucket of walnuts last weekend.  I had picked up some chestnuts and a few hickory nuts the week before, but the squirrels have finished off the rest of those crops.

I took advantage of the cool weather last weekend to put the scoop on the back of my tractor and use it to haul gravel to fill some potholes in gravel lane before winter sets in.