Backyard Blooms!

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you know it's fall in MI cuz it's leaf herding time!

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Looking out my back door at 200'.  I find the colors of fall as wonderful as the blooms of spring

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This time of year they dress up the Orange Balloon (largest helium in the US)
Its 118 feet tall with a volume of 210,000 cubic feet, tethered to about 400' flight limit
The gondola holds about 16 people

https://www.cityofirvine.org/great-park/great-park-balloon-carousel

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Hey shooter, how about some more of those nice snow scenes?

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It's our 1st real snow day, I haven't ate my hot meal yet so here's a close approximation from the archives

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I was 18 then.

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up hill both ways to school, IN THE SNOW!
the '67 snow buried our house to the roofline, Dad took the door off the hinge, then He dug snow, I carried it to the bathtub for dumping.  Got air into the house, we lived to tell the story!


Because you asked;
Hot meal    check
cold walk    check
Nap            Check!

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out for my morning track;
4-6 deer, 2 rabbits, 2 mice, 1 bird, 1 squirrel
1-3 new inches today erasing the tracks so I don't get confused 

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evening track
1 Red tail hawk, look'n for dinner, flying low.
6 mouse snow tunnels
3 new ground squirrel burrows
2 barn cats
1 squirrel


after nautical twilight, 7 deer came moseying up to the apple trees and shrubbery
our 4 acres is their "hide out" from the men in orange 
(Last years pic)

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Lake effect snow, like real snow only deferent   

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Some Christmas-like blooms from SoCal

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FINALLY, real snow, not lake effect, not Alberta clipping, just plain MI snow

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Beauty out of Ashes
After a few months and one good rain
There is new growth from the burned hills
This fire was in Orange County Saddleback Mountain (not the LA Palisades Fire)
On the panoramic pic you can see distinct lines away in the hills where the fire was stopped thanks to air retardant drops

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one more
all growth from the core of the burned bushes

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FINALLY
1 frog crocking, 3 flowers blooming, and garlic a growing......Til midnight when it hits 37F!!!

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I live on a groomed hillside without water and ever since the rain I've had croaking.
last year too without rain
No idea were they are or live there's no water.
Maybe toads.
How to get rid of the croaking, very loud with windows open maybe 50' away

[shooter]

 
before I moved here I lived about 2 blocks from a large Hospital, on the edge of "sketchy neighborhood" after a month, we'd sleep right through sirens, gun-shots.


here we couldn't sleep for the 1st month from all the frogs, owls, night bugs, winds.  After a month, I'd wake up from a dead sleep because the night bugs went silent!!


we have "woodland frogs" that are born near wet areas, but spend most of their life in the shades n foliage that stays damp under the ground cover.  Also tree-frogs that get their moisture from dews on leaves.


the only "pond frogs" are the Leopard frogs

[Lectroid]

You don't get spring peepers? 

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ya, those are the loudest, they sing the chorus while the bullfrogs hit the bass notes and if the crickets are frisky, they'll join in, but they're kinda Leary since they're always on the menu at the frog-pond.

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Couple of SoCal pics from the ride up today
Snow caps are Mt Baldy area

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California Poppies are starting to pop (late this year)
Will be bigger next week.

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Here is a scaley bloom that did not want me to pass.
We had quite an encounter

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I always let the snakes have right-of way!

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some SoCal blooms from todays hike to Bell View flag

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and these

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A study in yellow...
from todays MTB ride

This plant is actually a blight in SoCal
called "black" mustard as it squeezes out native plants

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last spring, dug up 3 wild strawberry plants, gave 'em good dirt, a box, and this spring they are paying me back!!  looks to be 80-100 blooms!!
If you've never ate wild strawberries, they look n taste NOTHING like the mutant GMO'd store stuff!!!
what they lack in moo-E-Grande size they make up for in Natures good flavor!!!

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first time for my blackberries to bloom

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bout 20 years ago I put in 5 blackberry plants, year 1 n 2 great berries, work took all my gardener time, they now cover about an acre forming one of the densest thorn-patches i've ever seen, fortunately they populated my "never building anything on this property" neighbors swamp/field, making a great small critter hedge!!

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blackberries just like mint they take over.
These are in pots, just gotta watch the runners

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Dogwood in full bloom n frog pond.  missed getting a pic of the snapper out sun'n the other day, he's a young'n, maybe 6" shell diameter but it's a small pond so he feels big!

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fried egg flowers in bloom in SoCal
MTB ride to Old Camp is like riding through a florist shop with all the smells and colors...
This was all burned up Oct '24. Great comeback.