Before The Colors All Fade Away (and another use for para cord)

[Mistwalker]

The first day of winter is two weeks away, so it won't be long till the colors have faded away' I thought walking around capturing some of the last of the colors would be a good way to finish running the batteries down the last few days.

Most of the time I went pretty light with just the water bottle carrier.

Big red gall on a brier vine.

Poplar cups

Looking across the field

Cacoons

Path through the evergreen wood.

Hardwoods and a small stream beyond the evergreens

The thought of eating the larvae in the galls on the horse weed...

...definitely made my cheese snack more appealing.

Some of the last persimmons are still adding their color to the palette

As are the ripe fruits of the horse nettle and various berries

A few odd flowers here and there, the once-purple thistle flowers are now white

Most of the passion fruit that's left has gone to seed now

But there is still some green ones laying around here and there

Natures super market does not segregate at all, the toxic and the non toxic are all intermingled. I thought finding persimmon, chives, hickory nuts, passion fruit, and horse nettle all in one spot was interesting...

...and Jimsonweed right beside it.

A hawk hunting just north of me

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[Mistwalker]

A few hoppy insects around

Canine tracks in the road

I found a few new persimmon trees. Spotting persimmon trees is pretty easy right now, they are among the few trees with anything left in them now

Among the others are the the sweet gums, which in the right light can look like persimmon trees from a distance due to the reddish color of the sweet gum balls.

But easy to tell up close as persimmons don't have spikes...

After a while of staring at persimmons too high to reach I found a smaller younger tree.

It was small enough, that I was heavy enough, to bow it down and pick the fruit. Sooo, I put my para cord bracelet to work and used it to try the tree down while I harvested. I had tried to use some spare cord that I had in my kit, but it wasn't long enough to tie. But it was orange so I wrapped it around the other cord so it would show up in the photo. Not a bad haul...maybe I need to learn more about basket weaving for collecting my harvests....

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[schmittie]

Thank you Brian. I have thoroughly enjoyed every adventure you have allowed me to go on.

 

[TheGame]

Great pics as usual Mist. The hawk picture reminded me of an Owl I saw last week right before heading in from hunting. Saw a great horned Owl swoop down and catch a squirrel and take it back to the nest. Shortly after another owl flew in the same direction. Wish I had a camera, but I was trying to be quiet since I was hunting and all.

 

[Mistwalker]

Thank you Brian. I have thoroughly enjoyed every adventure you have allowed me to go on.

Thanks man, glad you enjoy them. I hardly ever go hiking with anyone else...so I tend to take any of my friends here who want to go along with me through the photos

 

[Mistwalker]

Great pics as usual Mist. The hawk picture reminded me of an Owl I saw last week right before heading in from hunting. Saw a great horned Owl swoop down and catch a squirrel and take it back to the nest. Shortly after another owl flew in the same direction. Wish I had a camera, but I was trying to be quiet since I was hunting and all.

Thanks Dale. I've gotten to watch hawks take their prey several times over the years, and even captured it in photos a couple of times. But have only gotten to see an owl do that once. It is really cool watching birds of prey. Yeah, when hunting you pretty much have to pick one...a gun or a camera...trying both doesn't usually work out well lol.

 

[camoninja]

Great pictures. Any signs of deer near the persimmons?

 

[Mountain Mike]

Thanks for sharing the great pics!

 

[Mistwalker]

Great pictures. Any signs of deer near the persimmons?

Thanks man. Oh, there are signs of deer near everything in that general area. Jumped a few in the process of walking through the field, but in such high grass a shot would have been impossible. I found a tree I am going to set up in soon though

Thanks for sharing the great pics!

Thanks Mike, glad you enjoyed them!

 

[The Warrior]

Awesome thread as always mist. I especially like this photo. Surreal looking:

 

[JWL]

It always creeps me out a bit to see a wood of perfectly spaced trees, all the same size, on a grid. Looks so unnatural to me. Clear cutting large tracts of land in general is just weird to me.

Awesome thread as always mist. I especially like this photo. Surreal looking:

 

[Mistwalker]

Awesome thread as always mist. I especially like this photo. Surreal looking:

It is surreal looking isn't it?

It always creeps me out a bit to see a wood of perfectly spaced trees, all the same size, on a grid. Looks so unnatural to me. Clear cutting large tracts of land in general is just weird to me.

It is a Wildlife Management and TN Division of Forestry area. Out of the 27,000 acres I have found three such plots, maybe 1 to 1.5 acres each, of grid-planted trees. Two like this, and one of poplars. All three are close together, and all were done about 20 years ago as part of some forestry experiment. There are other forestry experiment areas there, but they don't involve clear cutting or grid planting. If they didn't have big wooden signs designating the area as an experimental area most people wouldn't even notice.

 

[Hawkeye5]

Good post Mist.

 

[tman038]

just today i saw a hawk sitting on the ground. i was driving and it flew away as i got closer to it so i couldn't tell for sure but it must have caught a small bird as there were feathers on the ground. thanks for sharing. amazing pics.

 

[sicily02]

Really enjoyed the pics and your commentary, Brian. The place you walked around in really looks like a fun place to visit.

Bryan

 

[omniviking]

Thanks so much MistWalker. great photo's.

did you try to predict ther weather with any of the persimmon seeds? Pop a seed open and look at the shape in the middle, a knife means cold that will cut to the bone. a Fork means there will be hay and forage to be had late into early winter. a spoon means you might be shoveling lots of snow.


I really enjoyed this thread.

Pat

 

[KFU]

Great pics! Thanks for letting us tag along

 

[Mistwalker]

Good post Mist.

Thanks man.

just today i saw a hawk sitting on the ground. i was driving and it flew away as i got closer to it so i couldn't tell for sure but it must have caught a small bird as there were feathers on the ground. thanks for sharing. amazing pics.

Thanks man, glad you liked them. Yeah, we have a lot of hawks around here. One landed on a light pole on the edge of town the other day and it was all I could do not to stop on the road side and see if I could capture it hunting in pictures.

Really enjoyed the pics and your commentary, Brian. The place you walked around in really looks like a fun place to visit.

Bryan

Thanks Bryan, glad you liked the post. Yeah, it's one of my favorite areas to wander around in.

Thanks so much MistWalker. great photo's.

did you try to predict ther weather with any of the persimmon seeds? Pop a seed open and look at the shape in the middle, a knife means cold that will cut to the bone. a Fork means there will be hay and forage to be had late into early winter. a spoon means you might be shoveling lots of snow.


I really enjoyed this thread.

Pat

Thanks man, glad you liked them and glad you enjoyed the thread. No, I had never even heard of that, I'll have to give it a shot.

Great pics! Thanks for letting us tag along

Thanks Chris, glad you enjoyed the wander!

 

[averageiowaguy]

Gorgeous. Those woods look a lot like the ones I grew up in, right down to the planted pine forest.

 

[Mistwalker]

Gorgeous. Those woods look a lot like the ones I grew up in, right down to the planted pine forest.

Thanks man. These little patches of planted pine are but postage stamps compared to the thousands of acres of pine I used to roam in Georgia that were owned by Bowater and Georgia Craft.