Sunday, October 25, 2009
Mark Baker, my 8th grade science teacher at Central Junior High School spiked a lifelong interest in nature when he assigned us to make a leaf collection.
So on this gorgeous October afternoon with the trees aflame incolors from raspberry to lemon I rode around Terradise in my golf cart and over 70 years later made another leaf collection.
In that 70 year time span my interest in nature has broadened to include birds, butterflies and gardening. But it was especially rewarding to be collecting leaves once more.
On my side porch the wind had deposited tulip poplar and sycamore from trees far from there. So using a small catalog for preserving inserted them and headed down toward the river and into the woods and added Shagbark hickory, red osier dogwood, Hopa crab, bald cypress, American and European beach, silver and black and Norway maple, and shingle oak. The ginkgo had dropped a few yellow leaves that look like little fans. The Buckeye leaves were all on the ground and fading as were the compound Ash leaves. A few Hawthorn leaves clung to their twigs but I couldn’t find the leaves from the yellowwood tree. Used all my energy collecting so pressings labeling will have to wait.
My article on MCHS antique appraisal in Star.