Nature's Calander

After a summer of swarming our feeder, the hummingbirds have left. Washing dishes won't be the same. Until next May.

The barn and tree swallows no longer swoop through the yard catching insects on the fly. 

Today I rode my bike to the community mailbox 4 km down the road, and felt cold for the first time in months.

The sun is shifting in its path and will soon be halfway to its winter solstice position in the south.

Leaves are looking worn and are beginning to turn colours.

The winter squash are fattening under their green umbrellas.

We are enjoying the last few days of summer, and hope you are doing the same. 

We look forward to those sweet days of fall, which in our location in the Canadian Maritimes, stretch out longer than other places we have lived.

Often we do not see snow until the new year. I am not waiting, and have refurbished my 20 year old snowshoes already.

The crows, also noting the shifts afoot, are starting to cruise our yard again, looking for peanuts in the shell.

You don't need a wall calendar to see where this is going. 

Nature's calendar is showing us exactly when it is. It is now, and it is beautiful.

Balance

I was checking the weather forecast recently, looking for first frost (not yet), and noticed that our days right now are 12 hours of sunlight, and 12 hours of darkness. 

Perfect balance.

This celestial event has been of interest to humans since ancient times. We call this moment the equinox, to reflect the balance we see in our sky. It is a recognition of the equal parts of opposing forces we see all around us. 

"Light a candle", wrote Ursula Le Guin, "and you cast a shadow." There is no light without dark.

Fall/Spring Equinox is a reminder for us to maintain our own balance as individuals. When we work on that we are able to help each other do the same for the human race, and the planet we all inhabit.

Without balance we are precariously perched.

“Let what happens happen. Everything must be equal in your eyes, good and evil, beautiful and ugly, foolish and wise.” 

 

- Michael Ende

We can all use this time to deepen our personal commitment to equality and balance in everything we do. 

If we were all to make such a commitment, everything else would take care of itself.

 

Seasonal Neighbours And Nature's Calendar

As much as possible I like to live without clocks, watches, day-timers, and calendars of any sort. I prefer to fly by the seat of my pants. 

You don't need a calendar if you live close to nature and go slow enough to notice what is going on around you. Besides letting you know everything from when to plant to when to lay up stores, it is also soul soothing to experience.

Take our seasonal neighbours that flew in recently. Every year around this time, Canada geese drop in to the field across the road to muster. They eat, nap, eat, nap, poop, flap their big wings, and prepare for their southerly migration. 

After lounging in the field all day, dusk hits and they alight in a noisy notice of their short flight to a nearby lake where they spend the night.

The arrival of the geese coincides with subtle colour changes in the forest, amongst other signs that Nature's cycles are moving on, and will do so with us, or without us. 

Most notable and potentially distressing, is the drop in temperature, and the slow slide into the coming darkness. We have already lost 3.5 hours of daylight since summer solstice. 

On the other hand, we have 3.5 hours more sunlight now than we will have on winter solstice. 

I am also grateful for the pile of wood we have laid up in the garage for winter, and for the fact that there are only 182 day/night cycles to go until spring equinox! 

Our temporary honky neighbours will most certainly move on before the really cold weather comes. I would go with them, if I could, but I can only fly for about 2 meters at a time and it would be hard to keep up.

Flap, flap, flap!

Instead I will stick around these parts, clean our wood stove, and look forward to the first cozy fire that will inevitably come shortly after the geese leave.

Happy Fall/Spring.

True Colours

The green pigment in leaves, a substance called chlorophyl, masks underlying colours that we don't normally see. 

In the fall, as chlorophyl diminishes due to shorter days and less heat, we see a leaf's true colours shining through.

We see their true colours, and that's why we love them.

So, like the leaves, we should not be afraid to let ours show. 




 



Our true colours.

True colours are beautiful

Like a rainbow.

- with apologies to Billy Steinberg, Tom Kelly and Cyndi Lauper
 

Fall Means Time To Make Basil Walnut Pesto

This year's basil walnut pesto about to go in the freezer.

It's not even Fall officially yet, and I am already mourning the missing solar radiation. What we lack in light and heat though, is easily made up by the bounty of the summer we are now harvesting.

Earlier this week we harvested our basil before first frost came, which it did a couple of days later. And when the basil is in, it is time to make pesto.


Our Basil Walnut Recipe


4 cups (packed) fresh basil

1 cup toasted walnuts

4 large cloves garlic

1 cup olive oil

1/2 cup Parmesan cheese

2 tablespoons lemon juice

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper


I put all ingredients into our 1970s Osterizer blender, saving the oil for last. I pulsed the blender, and used my wooden spoon to push everything down between pulses.

When nicely mixed, I put it all into ice cube trays to be frozen and used over the next few months. This is a very convenient way to preserve and dispense this yummy fresh food.

Usually we use our pesto on pasta. Recently we were thrilled to discover how to use it on pizza as an alternative to tomato based pizza sauce. 

We make a pesto and kale pizza that is a total taste sensation, that is made with our pesto, our dough, our kale, and mozzarella (we don't make that... yet).

Tomorrow will be pizza day as we now have lots of pesto, and our kale is going gangbusters due to the cooler weather we have been having lately. 

And what gardener doesn't like discovering new ways of using kale? 

Happy harvest to all the gardeners (and eaters) out there. Enjoy your celebration of good food, good friends, and good times.

Fall Equinox 2015

Fresh tomato soup for two garnished with some old cheddar cheese.

Happy Fall equinox to our readers in the northern hemisphere. Here in Nova Scotia, Canada the weather has noticeably turned from the hot of summer to the cooler days of autumn.

I put a jacket on to go for a bike ride today. We are letting the sun into the house because we need the heat more than we need to keep things cool. We are putting warmer blankets on our bed. Migrating birds are passing through on their way south.

And I can cook and bake to my stomachs content without melting.

Freshly baked bread for sandwiches.

Many around here say that fall is their favourite season. Snow is still several months distant, and days can be sunny and warm even if nights are cool. When the leaves change, the forest is transformed into a blaze of colours, and visitors come from all around to witness this natural phenomenon.

Happy Fall Equinox 2015.