Among the Trees

The weather was hot and sunny in Lanark yesterday, and there was a high wind which sent me off into the deep woods and away from all the tossing and blowing on the hill. It was dark off the trail as the place is elderly woodland, cool and densely shaded by canopies of huge old trees arching high above. There were clouds of mosquitoes hanging about everywhere, but I spent a few happy hours pottering about and looking for signs of autumn in my native place.

The Scouring Rushes are turning brown and leathery in the August heat, and the leaves felt (and sounded) dry, rustling gloriously as I walked along under the old maples, oaks, beeches, walnuts and hickories. The cicadas were in full voice, and I heard young turkeys chattering in the clearing beyond the ridge. Several flights of geese flew overhead, headed into the stubble barley fields by the Tay River to graze - their joyous flight is one of my own signs of the season, a good marker for impending autumn.

The leaves of the smaller trees by the gorge and the stream which flow into the beaver pond are already turning, and the first tints of rosy pink, yellow, orange and russet were on offer yesterday. Whether this is a result of this summer's heat or the sign of an early autumn, I have yet to discover.

... it appears that I need yet another entomology book, one which devotes itself entirely to order lepidoptera.