Persimmons

Persimmon trees can be small

or very tall.

This time of year they are ripening.  Because of the dry weather the leaves have already fallen.  My horses loved persimmons and learned how to rub against the tree to make them fall.

Looks like a good crop this year.

These are wonderful for farm fights, ripe or green.  I have enjoyed many "fights" with cousins and sisters growing up.  Ripe they are soft and sweet.  When green, they are very hard and bitter.  Pick your ammo.  Each has its pluses and minuses. 

The fruits are small but do vary with the type of tree 

and the weather that year.

You basically eat the fruit and spit out the seeds.  Wild animals love them!  There are many great recipes for breads, cakes, and spirits.  The seeds are the famous winter forecasting seeds.  You cut the seeds and the shape you discover forecasts your winter.  Carolina Nana can show you how.  Her persimmon seeds predict a cold winter.  I'm hoping my forecast is different.

UPDATE:  Our seeds show spoons so lots of precipitation for this winter.

A Crisp Wind Blows...

through the valley today raining leaves sideways. The trees rustle as if to say, "No, it's not time!" Another season begins.

The "falling back" of the clock has timed itself well. Food is falling. We gather walnuts, pecans, hickory nuts, pears, chestnuts, persimmons, and pawpaws. Preparing them for storage and use like the generations before us.

The figs frozen by the cold nights display the color of their last hurrah and drift to the ground.    Green still fills the valley as the hillsides are in constant color change.  Once again the valley shall shelter and feed the fifth generation of our family as they have fed the inhabitants that have gone before.

I believe the valley smiles.

We are home.

Over Due This N That

The last persimmon of the season

The geese flying south

Reflections

The leaves are gone but the sweet gum balls hang on.

Fall is in the air...

The last few mornings have been cool but hopefully we are far from a killing frost. The garden is still producing okra and a few cucumbers.

The chestnuts are falling along with the walnuts, persimmons and pecans. Marcy has planted winter greens where we cleared for two purposes, food and erosion control.

Do not know if someone will be buying walnuts this year or not. That was always my spending money growing up. We had to pick them up anyway and if we sold them we got some pocket change. I am not so eager this year to pick them up since I am a year older and a year stiffer. Bev and I picked several feed sacks full this afternoon.

Last year we got forty dollars for a bed load. It did fill up all the equipment with gas...last year!