Fall in Minnesota, 2014

It's too beautiful a fall day to do anything but post a few photos of what it looks like all around me.

Minnesota is having the most colorful fall I can remember. Not sure if it was caused by the relatively even rainfall over the summer or the deep dormancy of our last, extra-long winter, but the trees are at their best and the sun keeps coming out to add highlights.


A ginkgo tree all in yellow.


One of the many sugar maples.


Sweet fern (Comptonia peregrina), which is not a fern, but is native to sandy places here to the East Coast. I had forgotten or never noticed that it turns into this beautiful range of colors. And if you see some of this low shrubby plant, be sure to lean down and rub the leaves with your nose nearby.


A red oak (with orange leaves) and the kind of blue sky Minnesota seems to have all the time lately.