The past week or so of cooler temperatures,high wind and heavy rain events appears to have subsided for now. We were beginning to think nature had us heading precipitously into late fall and an early winter arrival. If she had, she appears to have given it second thought, and dialled back fall slightly. It was milder this morning than it has been in mid-afternoon for the past week; not at all hard to take.

We set out earlier than usual with Jackie and Jillie for a lazy and comfortable traipse through the ravine. Before we exited our driveway my eyes were drawn to  something strange. The sight of little red 'berries' where I'd never seen them before, all over our Japanese hemlock. It's located directly beside our weeping Jade crabapple tree which is itself absolutely crammed with tiny apples. 

It's possible I had assumed with quick glances that the red berries were from branches of the crabapple reaching over into hemlock territory. So I took a closer look and realized that as many apples there were on the crabapple there was an almost corresponding number of 'berries' on the hemlock. Both were planted decades ago beside the driveway. Some research informed me that the berries weren't berries at all, but rather 'cones' that had the appearance of berries. And within them were housed hemlock seeds.

It has been a truly extraordinary year for all manner of fruit trees. Never before have we ever seen such an abundance of fruiting bodies, seed-encased bodies in any of the trees, garden or forest. In the ravine, the forest floor is completely littered with cones from pines, hemlocks (tiny cones that look like cones), fir and spruce. We first noticed the rich abundance hanging on the trees last fall. From that time forward trees have dropped their cones, enriching the forest floor.

The wild apple trees bore a generous bounty of apples this year; last year there was a decided deficit of them. There was one year, could be a decade ago when an absolute paucity of seeds and cones was in evidence, making for a very difficult winter for the area wildlife; this abundance ensures they survive with flying colours. 

We were wondering why it was this year, on the other hand, that we saw so few spring-erupting fungi. Some years a mad proliferation of colourful, interesting, fancifully-shaped mushrooms fascinated us; not this spring. So we were interested that just as the array of fall wildflowers in their usual succession were fading, turning dark and brittle, mushrooms had begun finally to appear. Many get immediately knocked over by squirrels, who also take experimental nibbles out of them, just as they do with the apples.

Jackie and Jillie pay no mind to any of this. It's the messages left by other dogs who have gone before them through the forest trails that they mostly focus on. So they're busy with their own concerns, occasionally deviating from their intense concentration on the latest 'news' conveyed through the medium of excreta. About as elemental as nature gets.