Early Fall in Central NC

The central part of NC where I live in is still in the early part of fall.



We are usually two to three weeks behind the NC mountains. 



It's starting to look more and more like fall since the maples and dogwoods and a few other trees have put on their fall clothes.



The oak trees are among the last to change.



Living in a city with the nickname "City of Oaks" means until the oaks change colors we still have a lot of green.



My oaks haven't started changing at all yet.



But I have a lot of dogwoods in my yard and neighborhood which is making it colorful.



There also still a lot of flowers blooming.



The Japanese Magnolia above is not supposed to bloom until spring.



Although it's my next door neighbor's tree I think of it as mine since I see it from my kitchen window and I've seen numerous families move in and out of that house.



The first bunch of shots are ones I took yesterday at home and running errands.



I took the lake and trail shots today on the Falls Lake trail.



The magnolia I mentioned has bloomed too early before and lost the flowers to snow or hard freeze when tricked by a mild winter but by too early I mean February.



It's hard to imagine what will happen since it's already blooming in October. 



If it was just the few blossoms I wouldn't be concerned.



What worries me is that it's full of buds that shouldn't have started forming until late winter.



Bizarre to have buds and flowers before the leaves drop.



That type of magnolia loses it's leaves in the fall unlike the larger magnolias that keep their leaves year round.

What a difference a day makes

We are just starting to move into fall so every time I see fall colors (especially when I'm not the driver) I have to snap the shot.


The reason for the title of this post is yesterday we had very heavy rain but today was sunny.



I lost power for much of the day yesterday and into the evening but felt lucky since the coast was hit so much harder than where I live.



Bill and I went for a walk at the NC museum of art park and although there were signs of the storm it wasn't bad.



There were a lot of families taking advantage of the beautiful day.



The pictures aren't in a logical sequence. 



I'm having trouble getting used to using photobucket again.



My flicker account is acting up so I switched back to photobucket for this post.



If I don't go ahead and blog on the weekend, I don't get to it.



As I've mentioned before commuting to work does take a lot more out of me than when I worked from my computer at home so I don't blog as much.



By the way, the tree that looks like it's holding a boulder (photo 3, 6 and 7) or maybe a dinosaur egg is new to me and I haven't found any information about it online. I also didn't notice a plaque but I didn't dawdle except to take pictures.

First Walk in October

Bill and I went on a walk on the Neuse River Greenway trail today.



The paved trail is 27.5 miles long and seems to be popular with cyclist.



I think of it as being outside of Raleigh, NC but it's part of the Capital Area Greenway System. 



September was the hottest month of the summer which isn't unheard of but that hasn't happened in a long time.



I don't know if the red tree is a young pine that is ready to drop it's needles or not but I like the way it looks.



I can't really complain since June was quite cool and it didn't get very hot until July.



I don't think it has been a hotter summer than usual here.



It just started to get hot later and didn't get cooler until later.



Today was perfect for a walk.



Looking ahead at the weather I think it will be quite pleasant next week although there will be some storms.



There are starting to be signs of fall but plenty of wildflowers remain.

End of August beginning of September 2016

This is a hodgepodge post from walks and backyard birds over the past week and a half.



The shot below was taken on a walk along the Falls of the Neuse trail in Raleigh, NC.



Below is an American Robin. The first shot is of a female cardinal.



The catbird's mouth was so far open he looks like a singer full voice.



The American Robin below looks like its starting to lift off.



The next shot is of a grackle.



The mourning doves look rather companionable.



The male cardinal looks like he's probably not full grown yet.



I took the next two shots at Shelly Lake last weekend.



I love clouds this time of the year.



The bluejay looks like she's sticking out her tongue.



I took the next shot on a trail near falls lake that is part of the mountain to sea trail.



This is part of the trail in central NC near where I live and Bill I I took a walk on it today (Sunday September 4, 2016).



It is an 1150 mile trail that goes from one end of the state to the other.



I took the rest of the shots with my cell phone on a short walking break at work last week.



I find the camera in my cell phone works best when I'm getting closeups of flowers.