Wednesday, October 01, 2008

Discovering Gold


The early anticipation of a colorful fall sent me to the plant nursery yesterday. I returned with two pots of gold and one pot of purple mist. The photo above is a sugar maple. I have always wanted to buy and plant this tree but never had either the money or the yard space at the same time. I now will fulfill this wish. The peach-red colored leaves in the fall are such heart warming bursts of light that one cannot pass by such a tree without drinking in the honeyed picture.

I (we) also purchased a persimmon tree. (Photo above keeps loading sideways in Blogger! Thanks, annie, the .png format seems to do the trick!) Sometime a while back on one of my blog posts I talked about a hike that hubby and I took where we came upon golden globes of fruit lying in the fall leaves. Like migrating Indians we descended upon the most perfect orbs and ate our fill of persimmon fruit. This tree is indigenous to the area, named by the Algonquian Indians and a relative of the ebony family. In late September and early October the leaves turn yellow to match the fruit. This tree that we purchased produces SEEDLESS fruit which is just like finding gold that you don't have to mine! We will just have to see if the squirrels like it as much as we do.

I also bought a purple smoke tree and anticipate enjoying its misty beauty of pink and purple fuzz late next summer. We got a 20% discount if we bought three trees...I guess they saw us coming!

3 comments:

  1. Not too many leaves get gold here - most just get brown and drop - but many crepe myrtles turn red.

    That sideways thing has been happening to me over and over, too, Tabor. What's worked a few times was to delete the photo, open it in photoshop elements, resave it as a png file instead of a jpg and reload. I have no idea why this helped but my tech son told me to try it.

    Annie at the Transplantable Rose

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  2. Tabor I always enjoy planting trees. You will enjoy watching them change and grow as times goes by. With my small lot I planted 3 dogwoods and 2 Japanese Maples.
    Also a River Birch and Red Bud.
    Your retirement home will be more beautiful every year.

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  3. oh this must be a happy adventure for you. i loved the persimmon tree of my GA childhood...such delicious fruit! your descriptions here make me want to rush out to the market to get some of this fabulous fruit.

    our smoke tree is one of our favorite trees in the gardens. it is beautiful all late spring through fall with its purple leaves, but when it is filled with its pink powderpuffs it is a real show stopper!

    i wish we had room for a sugar maple. your landscape will be stunning next autumn. lucky, lucky you! :)

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