The woods is shining this morning.

Red, gold and green, the leaves

lie on the ground or fall,

hang full of light in the air still. – Wendell Berry

The Phases of the Moon

Oct. 3: The Monarch Butterfly Moon enters its final quarter.

Oct. 10: The Leafturn Moon is new.

Oct. 18: The Moon enters its second quarter.

Oct. 25: the Leafturn  Moon is full.

Sun Time

The sun now advances quickly toward winter, moving from a declination of minus 3 degrees, 16 minutes to minus 13 degrees 50 minutes by the end of the month.

Meteors in October

The Orionid Meteor Shower will peak near the giant constellation, Orion, in the early Morning of Oct. 20-21. Get up early and hunt for the shooting stars in the southeastern sky.

The Weather in the Week Ahead

The first cool front of October usually brings freezing nights to the Upper Midwest, but it only brings an increased chance of precipitation to the Lower Midwest. A secondary front often comes through Ohio around Oct. 4, signaling the close of Early Fall’s benign weather and the approach of Middle Fall, with its occasional threat of frost, major leafturn and the close of wildflower bloom.

The Natural Calendar

This time of Middle Fall brings Full Leaf Color Season to the ashes. It opens Junco Season at local birdfeeders, Sprucegrowth Season on the spruce trees and Asian Ladybeetle Invasion Season throughout the country. This week finishes Purple Martin Season, Autumn Crocus Season, Swamp Marigold and Beggarticks Seasons, Autumn Sedum Season, Virgin’s Bower Season, Jumpseed Season (all the seeds having jumped to the ground), Touch-me-not Season, Cicada Season and (if the weather is cold) Daddy Longlegs.

Wind comes in ahead of the first real October cold, pulling off foliage from box elders, buckeyes and sycamores, hickory and chinquapin oaks leaves. Sparrow song, robin migration song, crows calling, sporadic cardinals, cackling grackles and whistling starlings mark the days.

From one woods to the next, the season moves from summer to fall and back again. One woodlot can be fully green, no signs of change. Then down the path a mile, there is a whole other season of the canopy. The full turning and falling has begun. The locusts are gold, and maroon shows more now on the ashes. Maples are blushing. The black walnut trees are bare.

In the undergrowth, zigzag goldenrod is still open, most white and violet asters, and some scattered white snakeroot. But the ironweed seeds are becoming brown and soft. Drying tall goldenrod blends with the dead Bermuda grass, foxtail, timothy, smooth brome and orchard grass. Nettles are bleached with age. The last huge silver orb-weaver spider webs hang in the brittle wingstem, shine in the early morning sun.

In the Field and Garden

A favorable October lunar times for planting root crops, setting spring flower bulbs and transplanting perennials, will occur as the Moon wanes early in the month.  Dig up cannas, caladiums, tuberous begonias and gladiolus prior to heavy frost.  Transplant new trees and shrubs; then, make sure they have plenty of water. Mulch all perennials and new transplants after watering. Get out your rose collars and fill them with dirt. Offer manure to your rhubarb; it won’t refuse. 

Almanack Literature

A Gentle Farmer

By Lou Beard, Shelby, Ohio

I was raised outside of a small, quaint town in Ohio by the name of Sycamore. It was a peaceful town where the Sycamore trees grew wild by the small creeks. My father was a loud-spoken, large-frame strong farmer, but a gentle one. He did not appear that way, nor did I think of him in that way when I was young. But now, I, as an adult older than he was when he died, realize how gentle and compassionate he was.

When the sows on the farm were ready to have their babies, he would sleep in the barn with them. He put them in individual pens by themselves, and he would sleep outside on a cot, waiting for the right time. The “cot” was a bed made from bags of hog feed stacked up and a bale of straw. When the time came, he was right there to help deliver the little ones.

As they appeared, he would clean them, wrap them in a clean, dry feed sack and lay them aside until all the babies were born, sometimes 12 or so. If one appeared weak, it would be taken to the house for extra care. He knew that if it were left behind in its weakened condition, it would not survive.

After he analyzed all the little ones, he would put them back in the care of their mother, checking on them often. I can remember two sows delivering at the same time, and dad jumping over the divider between the sows to help both mothers deliver their babies. Most of the mother sows would deliver within a few weeks of each other, so he stayed out in the barn for weeks until it was all over.

He knew that every animal was important to his livelihood and to the welfare of the family. He did the same thing with the cows and sheep. By the time the birthing season was over in the spring, we had a bunch of healthy animals in the barn and a few, sometimes more than a few, frisky rambunctious healthy pets in the basement room we called the furnace room because it was so warm. My sister and I raised the weak babies on bottles. She warmed the milk and fed them in the middle of the night and in the mornings before school.

I can’t remember ever losing a little pig or lamb. Every year it was the same thing. We got so accustomed to having little ones in the basement that it seemed strange to have an empty furnace room. I can remember crying when dad would say, “It’s time for them there babies to go out and face the real world.” That was the day mother was more than happy, but for us, it was a sad day.