Anyone's leaves turning early?

im just north of toronto ontario.
the leaves are all falling,but they are still green! little change in the colours overall.
fall flowers are already in full bloom. geese are very active,i hear them daily now for the past 3 weeks!
squirrels and chipmunks are digging up the lawn like crazy!
the corn is only 3-4 ft high.
my lawn was dead for 6 weeks due to lack of rain and heat,now its growing like mad. we had a few days of 'good' rain about a week ago,been dry since then,now supposed to get to 35 degrees C. (40 with humidity) by the weekend! the flies this year have been horrendous!
last winter was non-existant,and i kinda hope for the same this year!

reply to post by littled16


I thought the lightening bug thing was bizarre. Not to mention that they are my favorite part of summer, to just have them *poof* is a little disconcerting.

I have searched all over the internet but have not seen any mention of it.

But then the habits of lightening bugs are usually the hottest trending topic.

Absolutely, The trees in the south, have begun to change colors already, but not the pretty yellows and oranges, mostly burnt looking brown leaves, on most of the trees around here. I think it had to do with the fact that we didnt get any rain for over a month, and temps over a 100 degrees for weeks and weeks. Its like the midwest and parts of the south are becoming a desert, the breadbasket of the world, isnt doing good this year, you can expect huge price jumps in grain and wheat porducts, not good

reply to post by nixie_nox


I could be wrong, but we have so many mosquitos right now they're running out of people to bite. Maybe they have taken to chomping on lightning bugs to supplement their diets!

But seriously, we had very few lightning bugs this year, and what ones we did have didn't stick around for very long.

Northern B.C., leaves on poplar trees were changing 2 weeks ago. In central, getting the odd cottonwood starting to change...but also LOTS of drying out dead trees. My apple tree, (Which I didn't prune this year) Started drying out. There is fruit, but the leaves are dying and brown. Lots of this happening. Can take a pic if interested.

I don't know how wierd the weather is over in the US but here in the UK it's pretty crazy. As I speak there is what can only be described as a monsoon going on right now. I'm talking streets becoming rivers in about 2 minutes. The crazy thing is there are blue skys in sight but these are like impossibly small rainclouds pissing all over us, very heavy.

I don't know if you get swifts in America but they left the country weeks ago, if not months because the weather was unsuitable for nesting and breeding.

Every year we get swifts nesting in our alcoves and they are fascinating to watch them teach their young.

There have been reports of birds just dumping the eggs out of nests because it's just a lost cause.

They've gone, they migrated super early! When the animals change behaviour, you know something's up...

ETA: I've just been reading some more about Swifts. They really are quite fascinating. I know this is slightly off topic but I would like to share it anyway:

Except when breeding, Swifts spend their lives in the air, living on the insects they catch in flight. They drink, feed, and often mate and sleep on the wing.[3] No other bird spends as much of its life in flight. Feeding parties can be very large indeed in suitable insect-rich areas, such as wetlands. Reports of as many as 2000 Swifts feeding over flooded gravel pits, lakes and marshy river deltas are not uncommon, and may represent an ingress of Swifts from a huge area of maybe 100 kilometres radius. It has for example been suggested that many of Western Scotland's Swifts fly to Lough Neagh in Northern Ireland to feed on the abundant and nutritious "Lough Neagh Fly".

They sleep in flight!!!???

How the hell do they do that?

Originally posted by nixie_nox
reply to post by littled16

 

I thought the lightening bug thing was bizarre. Not to mention that they are my favorite part of summer, to just have them *poof* is a little disconcerting.

I have searched all over the internet but have not seen any mention of it.

But then the habits of lightening bugs are usually the hottest trending topic.

Sorry if this is off topic but.... I love ladybugs. This year there were no spots. I had solid big lady bugs, almost orangish in color- many were dead. I know that solid lady bugs do exist. I read somewhere it is an Asian variety. Very odd.

Now on topic- our leaves are not falling but they are dull green. There is some yellowing but I assume the drought is doing that to them.

I am glad to see the Candians reporting in because fall moves from north to south, obviously.

But if it has already started up there, then I know it is isn't purely drought related.

reply to post by littled16


The tiger mosquitoes this year are insane.

My kid won't go outside anymore, I had severeal on me just walking from the my door to the car.

reply to post by nixie_nox


Yes our trees are just about ready to turn and the squirrels, coyotes, moles, rabbits, birds and other critters are acting like they do right before summer goes into autumn.

At least we're not having 100F, hot blazing sun.

The weather today was absolutely beautiful after a nice rain last night.

The sky was a brilliant blue, the clouds big and puffy and a gentle breeze to compliment the cooler weather.

But my bones feel like fall will be coming early this year.

Expect food prices to go up as there was not enough rain during the growing season in major parts of America's food growing sections.

We had to take our dogs on a walk this morning to make up for no walk during the lightening and rain storm last evening and hopefully the weather holds so we can get another walk in this evening...............major event of the day for our dogs.

Sitting out on my deck this afternoon was a real treat, the weather again here was so beautiful, the grass finally coming back and green again.

Here in my part of SC in the Southeast, the trees are all still green. I have to say we've been very lucky for the past 2 months as we've had a lot of rain fall (doesn't make the drought go away, but the rains have been very constant so it's helped a lot with the plants, creeks, ponds and some of the lakes).

Normally some of the maples around here are the first to start turning and they wait until late sept.

However, the temps have been unusually low here for August. July tends to be our hottest month, but high 90's will persist well into september. However for the past couple of weeks, the temps have been down in the low 90's and this past week in the low 80's. I attribute that to the rains however as those low temps day was overcast with rain all day.

I'm keeping an eye out myself on the tree leaves, but not how early they turn, rather the intensity of the color when they do turn. We had one fall where the colors were vibrant and the most colorful I've ever seen. Even my wife commented on it.
That winter it snowed 3 times. Once is rare for us here. Then last fall the leaves didn't seem as bright in their fall colors, and even seemed pale.
That winter was no snow, and as many of you know, winter seemed to stop in January and spring came to town!

I used to just ignore what a lot of the "old timers" around these parts would say. But now I'm listening. They've been around long enough to see patterns like that (and now I'm starting to get up there in age with them, hehehehehehe, Won't be long before I'm one of those "old timers" myself).

reply to post by AuntB


Now that I think about it, usually we have lots and lots of Lady Bugs with black round spots and I didn't see any, just red ones.????

Also, last year, gardening I had quite a few bees, this year hardly any. The bees are gone for the most part.

Good point.

reply to post by Wide-Eyes


Yesterday afternoon it was the weirdest thing................sitting on my deck the sky was blue and it was sunny and I heard thunder and lightening

I asked my son about it and he said it was a little grayish behind me, a long way off.

Then a slight rain moved in, it drizzled for a few minutes and left.

Later last night it really rained.

But here in the Midwest, our farming bread basket - we've had a long, dry, hot, blazing summer.

A couple I know that farm said they had to plow all their stuff under as their sprinklers weren't enough to compensate for the drought we had this summer.

Really weird to hear loud, rumbling thunder and the crack of lightening and have a sunny blue sky - weird.

reply to post by nixie_nox


Same here...........love lightening bugs but haven't seen any this summer?????

reply to post by ofhumandescent


As I read your post, some thunder crackled in the background!!! What are the odds!!! I can't make this stuff up! Sorry for all the exclamation marks but honestly, the syncronisation of things in my life is impossible at the moment.

Sooooo many coincidences right now, it's kind of creepy. I'm not just talking about ATS. In general, I'm thinking of things and something happens that completely aligns with my train of thought.

reply to post by MDDoxs



We have a Dawn Redwood, which is a member of the Sequoia Family (only one of the three that can grow in our zone) and I have had to water her like crazy this whole summer.

My husband flipped when he saw our water bill - told me to take a shower out there with the tree.

She was looking pretty orange but with the past couple of good rains and watering her at night she seems to be recovering.

I talked to the nursery we bought her from and they said it was a really rough year for trees in the Midwest US.

Dawn Redwood during drought before I started watering her


After a couple good rains and a massive water bill



As you can see her leaves turning bright green again - whats up with my camera I don't know but boy our water bill was high in order to save her. She was just planted Oct 2010.

The Dawn Redwood - Google it - thought to be extinct 10 million years ago, a real Jarassic Park tree.

She's grown about three feet the past year, even with the drought.

reply to post by ofhumandescent


I love redwoods, I think they are so pretty.

reply to post by Wide-Eyes


What are the odds?

Strange huh

I've never in my 59 years ever heard loud thunder or lightening crash with a sunny sky.

It was eerie to say the least.

Trees dropping leaves all over the place here in NYC.

reply to post by nixie_nox


Our Dawn Redwood, I named her Dawn (their really male / female together trees is my understanding) will live at least 1,000 years and she will grow to be a massive tree.

Long after we and this house we have is probably gone, she hopefully will still be around.

I'm in the Midwest and the Dawn Redwood is the only tree in the Sequoia family that can grow in a zone 5 (Midwest US).

Her trunk has almost doubled and she has grown from 7 feet to about 13 feet since October 2010 when we had her planted.

As we don't normally spend money on planting big trees this was quite a investment for us.

A lot of people laugh at her now because she is still thin but wait another hundred years and she will be massive.

Google Dawn Redwood...................I love all Sequoias (really all trees).

Gosh, we only have four trees on our property and boy again our water bill to keep them going was massive.