Tag: Maple Tree

Picture of the Day for September 22, 2016

The September equinox marks the moment the Sun crosses the celestial equator – the imaginary line in the sky above the Earth’s equator – from north to south and in the Northern Hemisphere, it marks the first day of autumn or fall.  And with autumn, one thinks of shorter daylight hours which causes the leaves changing color for autumn’s spectacular foliage display. Even on this cloudy and cooler day, I have one maple tree which does not want to let summer go as it always has about half the limbs staying green while the other half turn bright red before any of the other trees in the area.

Summer Passing to Autumn

Summer Passing to Autumn

Picture of the Day for September 6, 2015

The Labor Day weekend is often referred to as the end of summer (even if not the end of astronomical summer yet), but apparently the maple trees think it is autumn as leaves started to turn last week since they heard it was meteorological autumn already. So I guess it is the end of summer (even if the dew point is 73 right now and doesn’t fell like autumn yet).

Start of Autumn Sunset

Start of Autumn Sunset

Picture of the Day for September 25, 2012

The maple tree has many functions, including being a major source of pollen in early spring before other plants have flowered and are important for the survival of honey bees. I don’t have a lot of maple trees but there must be enough to keep my bees going in the spring.

The Sugar maple is tapped for sap to produce maple syrup, maple sugar or maple taffy. The sugar maple wood is the choice for bowling pins, pool cue shafts and butcher’s blocks.

But the bright autumn colors of the maples, from yellows, oranges and reds, might be what gets the most attention and many countries have leaf watching traditions such as Japan which is called “momijigari”. The custom of viewing the changing color of maples in Korea is called “Danpung-Nori”. Leaf peeping is an informal term, commonly used in the United States, for people who travel to view and photograph the fall foliage in areas where foliage changes colors.

Leaf Peeping