The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Usually a phrase used around a certain winter holiday – for me this is the most wonderful time of the year. Happy First Day of Autumn!

Asters are a welcome continuation of color into the fall months.

Today just happens to be an extra beautiful day in addition to the first day of fall. The sun is bright, there is a cool breeze and the temperature is hovering at comfortable.

Today I spent some time under my very favorite type of tree – the Katsura Tree (Cercidiphyllum japonicum). The tree here at the office is perfectly shaped thanks to our Master Gardener volunteers and currently sports a fragrance some describe as cotton candy, baking sugar cookies, vanilla pudding, or brown sugar. It is a sweet perfume that ignites the autumn air and for me, this is the smell of fall.

These green leaves do not give away their scented secret just by looking. You have to visit a Katsura in person, right as the colors are changing to earn the joy of this sweet scent.

It is not flowers that make this scent but the turning of the foliage, the chemical process by which these dainty heart-shaped leaves transition from true green to egg-yolk yellow, creates as a byproduct something I wish they would bottle and sell or make into candles.

Blooming through the summer, Black-Eyed Susans will continue well into fall with regular deadheading.

The katsura gets me thinking about the other plants to appreciate as we inch closer to the second best season of the year – winter! Fall is not just the time for ornamental cabbage and kale and garden clean ups. There are a variety of showy perennials just waiting to strut their stuff after the show-off summer annuals have petered out. These plants not only provide us viewing pleasure (and delight other senses) they provide a much needed late-season nectar source for many insects. These insects may be preparing to overwinter or migrate or may be having their last supper and may become bird food soon, but the flowers that feed them are yearly reminders that there is more to flowering interest than summer annuals.

Ants enjoy the nectar of Tansy flowers.

Some flowers, like Asters and Goldenrods, wait until fall to show their blooms.

Black-Eyed Susans, Phlox and Daisies bloom all summer and will bloom into the fall with a mid-season deadheading.

Covered with insects, buzzing with life and interestingly colored some plants are just interesting no matter what the season.

The silvery leaves of Mountain Mint frame modest flowers that insects cannot resist adding interest to any fall garden even after the flowers are finished.

This is the beginning of the harvest season. Let’s not forget about the ornamental fruit of fall as we gather and preserve the edibles. Crabapples fruit are starting to dress trees in rich jewel tones.

,And should we forget, as we are enjoying this beautiful fall weather, that winter is on its way we can just look to the Winterberry Holly, whose fruits hang on well into the snowy months, far after the leaves of this deciduous shrub have fallen but have their beginnings in the early months of fall.