Tree Mushroom

Fungus will grow on trees when any wood has been exposed, by, for example, small animals or birds hunting for bugs, and especially where moisture can accumulate. It could mean that the tree might die, but not necessarily. If the tree is strong and healthy enough, it can resist the effects of the exposure and fungal growth and minimize the damage to itself.

Autumn Leaf

Green leaves of summer turn red in the fall
To brown and to yellow they fade.
And then they have to die, trapped within
the circle time parade of changes.

- Phil Ochs, Changes

The Fruit of their Labour

Do trees work?

Leaves of Summer

"At the doctor's office, after the drops are put in Morag's eyes, the entire world swims and flounders in front of her. She gets only as far as the second line of letters on the chart. After that, blur all the way. The new glasses are hideous. Round. Metal-framed. Morag now looks like a tall skinny owl... In front of the mirror she rages and curses... Morag goes upstairs to her room. She looks out the window at the maple tree... LEAVES! She can see the leaves. Individually, one at a time, clearly. She has not known before this that you are supposed to be able to see the leaves on a tree, not just green fuzz."

- Margaret Laurence, The Diviners

Pine Flowers

I was surprised because the tree looked like a red pine. I grew up with red pines, have been around them all my life, and I didn't remember ever having seen such "flowers" on them before. They look like tiny pine cones, but they're soft and colourful - I guess they are the beginnings of pine cones.



I was about to pull out of a parking lot in a conservation area when my eye was caught by a pine tree with what looked like red flowers on it. The sunbeams just happened to be lighting on them at that moment, or I probably wouldn't have noticed them.

So of course I checked in my tree book when I got home. It says that it is called a Slash Pine. Its range is "Coastal Plain from S. South Carolina to S. Florida, and west to SE. Louisiana..."

I wondered how it had gotten way up here until I read that "Slash Pine is extensively grown in forest plantations both in its natural range and farther north. Its beauty makes it popular as a shade and ornamental tree."
- National Audubon Society Field Guide to Trees, Eastern Region

I assume that someone at the conservation authority planted it there. Though when I think about it, if a tree like this can grow somewhere so far away from its original habitat, could it have spread here naturally?

Cool Beauty

"...to sit in the shade on a fine day, and look upon verdure,
is the most perfect refreshment."

- Jane Austen, Mansfield Park, 1814

View

from the Niagara Escarpment
on a misty day