Greetings and salutations, everyone; yes, once again it is I, Mani the purebred border collie, filling in for the guy I live with, and here today to tell you all the latest news from our garden. You may remember me from such posts as “Talking Turkey”, among so many, many others.
Here I am in a characteristic pose.
I’m lying next to the big pile of leaves, and the guy I live with has been talking about making another bulb frame there, but this time “more successful” than the last ones he built. He’s thinking about using cinder blocks, which might be ugly, but there are ways of disguising them, like making a sort of front panel with some of the cedar boards removed from the enclosure fence, attached to the cinder blocks.
Well, we’ll see about that.
Meanwhile, and even though we had a light dusting of snow this morning, we still have Crocus niveus in flower, though this picture was taken a few days ago.
Most of the gardening here, lately, has involved raking up leaves, cutting back plants that were smashed by the heavy snow that fell two weeks ago, filling the bird feeders, and sprinkling vole repellent all over the place.
Really not much of anything, which is a relief to the guy I live with, who says gardening can be exhausting.
Though he was finally able to lift the cover to the seed frame and put all the pots of newly-sown seeds there, so they won’t dry out sitting on the patio.
Most of the interesting stuff, for me, has involved walking among fallen leaves.
The creek is very interesting right now. Not to the guy I live with, but to me. There isn’t any water in it (the guy I live with said that when he and his wife first moved into our house there was water flowing in the creek all the time), but there are very interesting scents there now.
The guy I live with said that maybe coyotes were using the creek for cover. He said they do that sometimes, instead of running through the field.
I didn’t see the other interesting thing, the day before yesterday, but the guy I live with did.
That’s a culvert that drains water from the streets on the west side of the field.
But yesterday I did see the interesting thing. I was just walking along, like you see me doing in the picture, when all of a sudden there was this orange tabby cat super-arched right in front of me. The cat then went right for me, and it was a good thing the guy I live with had a firm grip on my leash, otherwise, as he said, I “might have been shredded to pieces”.
The cat ran off. Maybe I looked too tough for it.
Then yesterday afternoon it suddenly got chilly and very overcast.
On my evening walk yesterday, the guy I live with started taking pictures of the willows in the field.
All the pictures were blurry except one, which he posted on Facebook, but he said he liked this so much I’m going to share it here.
You can see how overcast, dark and gloomy it was last night.
Pretty cool, huh?
By Tinkle Time last night mist was falling, and then this morning there was a dusting of snow, which melted in the sun today.
I’ll leave you with a picture of me and the planet Jupiter, which is almost right over our house.
That light in the upper center of the picture is in our back yard.
Until next time, then.
the miserable gardener 
That gloomy photograph is spectacular.
Thanks. It isn’t often that gloomy here.
Yes, that picture is impressive. So is the kitty. Maybe the kitty likes you. Heather messes with Rhody like that sometimes. Rhody is unimpressed though. Those look like cottonwood leaves. Are any maples native there?
Thanks. The guy I live with says Acer glabrum and A. grandidentatum are native here. There are two large A. grandidentatum in the garden here. Very similar to the eastern sugar maple.
Oh, I should have remembered that, especially since Acer grandidentatum was formerly a subspecies of Acer saccharum.
The guy I live with said it’s the other way around. That combination was proposed in 1952, but Nuttall’s original description dates from 1838.
Here it is, page 269, at the bottom of the page. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/5290573#page/269/mode/1up
It wants me to agree to something that I do not want to agree to, but I believe it. What is it now, a species or a subspecies?
The guy I live with says it’s always been a species. A botanist wanted to make it a subspecies in 1952, but no one has accepted that.
Intermountain Flora said it may be a “western expression” of the eastern sugar maple. It was tapped for syrup by Mormon settlers, and the guy I live with has tasted the sap. Very mapley.
If you’re talking about “acknowledgement of harmful content”, that’s not anything harmful to your computer or phone, it’s an acknowledgement that some of the older publications available online may contain offensive common names, examples of bigotry, racial slurs, and so on. Even in scientific publications.
I like that explanation better because that is how I would like to know it, as a separate species. Being a sugaring maple is not the same as being a sugar maple. Even the big leaf maple here is a sugaring maple, although not likely as closely related to sugar maple as yours are.
Anyway, the site just wanted me to accept cookies, but because it did not specify if they were macaroons, I declined.
The guy I live with says the cookies are harmless; they’re from libraries. Look up Biodiversity Heritage Library on Wikipedia.
And besides, you can always delete cookies later. But if you delete cookies all the time, like the guy I live with does (he deletes all emails and everything else, out of habit), some websites won’t recognize your computer and ask for verification.
Acer grandidentatum ranges down to Mexico, but selections from New Mexico, like ‘Manzano’, don’t get red autumn color here, because of their more southerly distribution.
The guy I live with is still irked with himself for not buying several large specimens at a nursery some years ago, and creating a maple woodland in the “way back” part of our garden.
They are subject to anthracnose, though.
I got several common sugar maples that were grown from seed (so not a cultivar) years ago, but then did not develop the site where I wanted to put them, so needed to give them away. I am still bummed about that. I intend to do so eventually, but expect to find that, although they are much more colorful, they are not as productive as the native big leaf maple can be for sugaring. No maple is particularly productive here, but just a little bit of sugar would be adequate. (Sugaring is not practical here because winter is not very cool, and ends so abruptly, without cool weather to prolong the process.)
There are large, old sugar maples in Green Mountain Cemetery in Boulder. Not a very common tree here.
They live in Gold Rush towns here, along with the invasive black locust, because miners brought their seed from the East. Neither have been popular since. The few sugar maples that I have seen here seem to be happy with the mild climate.
Makes sense that they wouldn’t be happy there.
but they are. They do not seem to mind the mild winters. Of course, they are happier in Gold Rush towns, where winters are cooler.
Well you never know how plants are going to behave.
like felines?
Strong winds have brought down the last of the leaves here and the Head Gardener has been busy in some areas. I live in hope that I may be able to get out and about to run the lawnmower to collect those around the grassy areas. I like the dark photographs very much!
Thanks. It isn’t usually that gloomy here in the evening, but it is dark a lot at night.
Most of the leaves are down here, except for the apple tree and the scrub oaks.
Glad you survived the kitty interloper-they can be unpredictable so no encounters are always better than a hissy fit. I think we had about 4 teeny tiny flakes of white stuff. The weather guys keep saying we might get some rain mixed with snow this evening but we have our doubts any will make it to our neighborhood. We hope you and the man you live with have a nice Thanksgiving.
P.S. Nice moody pic of the willow and background as well as a good pic of Jupiter.
Thanks. The guy I live with said Jupiter is really far away.
The kitty was scary since I just came upon it suddenly.
We’re not doing anything for Thanksgiving, buy you have a nice one.
Maybe we’ll get some snow.
Mee-yow you’ve had it all there Mani an Guy! Cocusess look so purrty! Look it all THE leeves….speck-taculur! That Orange Tabby sure was furoshuss…..till hee wasn’t, mew mew mew. Wee hope you found great **sniffa’ss** Mani!
**purrss** BellaDharma an ((hugss)) BellaSita Mum
The kitty was very scary. We’re hoping to get more snow, maybe tonight or tomorrow, but you never know, these days.
Wee catss can bee scarey…Mee iss sorry that cat scared you Mani. Wee gotted more rain yesterday….14 dayss in a row…you has our snow it seemss… **sighss**
We got an inch of snow last night, or early this morning.
Kitties are very scary, as I discovered.
Those atmospheric photos were really something!
Blessings to you and your boon companion on this Thanksgiving!
Thanks; same to you.
It snowed a little last night here.
Mee-yow you gotted more snow??? **sighss** Wee want snow so bad heer. Yes wee Kittiess can bee furry scarey butt wee gotta act tuff to get bye inn THE werld. Iss not purrsonal Mani 😉
Just a bit of snow.
Kitties ate definitely tough and scary.
Mani Mani Mani!!!! Wee gotted snow!!! 4 inchess as of today Novembrr 30th! **happy dancin**
Good for you. I like snow. We may not get more snow for a while.
Mee only likess to ‘look’ at snow! Iss BellaSita Mum who lovess snow…..mew mew mew….
I’ve heard that kitties don’t like snow.