I am showing my stupidity here…but haven’t lived in the northeast long enough to learn all my tree names. I found a bunch of these “nut shells” on my neighbor’s property when I went to feed their chickens while they were away. I forgot to ask what they were, so I’ll ask here.
Since Beech trees are abundant, I thought maybe a Beech nut although I don’t know what those are. Then I remembered back to when I used to hike to Mill Hill in my childhood and there was a lone chestnut tree up there and thought maybe this was a chestnut shell – I saw no sign of any chestnuts near these pods though.
Empty Shell of a- Chestnut? I thought I’d get a photo of them just for fun. I suppose some animal had eaten what was once inside.
I did a lot of gardening when I lived in Florida. It really wasn’t much fun in summer – and that is when the weeds would grow like mad of course – and I had just about every kind of southern flower and plant in my large yard. My favorites were the Camellias and Crepe Myrtle, but I also had lots of azaleas under the Oaks and yellow and white Jasmine covering the fence. I lived in that house for 12 years and added more to the yard each year.
The north has it’s own collection of gorgeous flowers that are not seen in the south. Hydrangeas are one such plant. It’s just too hot for many plants to survive that heat and the perennials need a dormant time (in winter) that the southern plants don’t get. At least not to the extent that the northern ones do.
I’ve been trying my hand at drying the blue hydrangeas that grow in the front yard of my rental house. I wrote a page about Hydrangeas and how to dry them, with lots of links, at my Squidoo site – if you are interested. I had one large blossom dry up nicely (in the picture to the right) and just added a few more smaller and darker blue ones to the vase, but my favorite thing to do is photograph them.
I think my pictures turned out better than my attempt at drying. I’ve used them to start a new store (#6) at Zazzle. I’ve sold many blue hydrangea cards and stamps from my main store- Narrow Road Designs, so this is an off shoot of that.
Our little town has a Girl Scout Camp that runs along one side of the lake. It’s a beautiful area and those Girl Scouts are lucky!
All summer the Camp is off limits to any of us “non-girl scouts”, but now that the girls are gone, we locals can walk our dogs or hike on the property.
Girl Scout Camp Road
There is a beautiful beach area and I noticed that some new benches have been added.
Camp Beach
This area of the camp seems to be where they all gather for something. Of course I have no idea what, but it looks like they have a fire and sit on these “seats”. Maybe they sing songs and sacrifice old counselors.
Assembly and Fire Area?
Even though we have had a lot of wind and rain lately the color seems to be hanging on. The Camp caretakers will plow the road when snow falls so we can continue to enjoy our walks.
The camp is beautiful at all times of the year.
I just took these photos a few days ago – the end of September, 2009. The best color is along the swampy areas with just a few other trees beginning to change.
I have more photos on my Squidoo page: New England Foliage
