Growing up in SE Texas, we didn’t get the Fall color show that most of the country enjoys.
About the only Fall color I can remember from those days were the massive displays of the invasive Chinese Tallow trees that seemed to be everywhere. Somewhere along the line the Chinese Tallow trees seem to have disappeared from the environment. And their multicolor fall display went with them.
I can remember seeing the fall images in magazines and not quite believing the pictures were real and not manipulated. That is until I made a trip up the Blue Ridge Parkway in October back in 2007. I could not believe the vividness of the mountains covered in reds and oranges and yellows.
It was after that trip that my red oak, that I’d planted in the mid ’90’s, started to come into it’s own every fall. It’s only been in the past couple of years that it’s grown tall enough to be seen from the road in front of the house.
Even so, the predominant color in the world outside my windows is green. And it stays green most of the way through the winter months.
A good number of our crape myrtles turned overnight — at least, the ones that still had leaves.
I suppose I might have noticed that had my crape myrtles not been leafless (mostly) for a month or so. I did notice my big pecan tree is still mostly green and mostly leaved still. What is worrying to me is the number of pine trees that have died this summer. It seems like I’m seeing brown needles everywhere this fall.