COLORS ARE GONE FOR THE YEAR!

Today, my husband and I went for a flight over the Upper Connecticut River Valley. The colors are definitely GONE for the year. The flight was bumpy and it was difficult to get a good photo, but I did try. So here it is!
As you can see, all the colors are washed out and it's just kind of "mustardy". So, I guess winter is really on it's way. It's time to get involved with other things.
At the moment I am trying to line up a course for ILEAD (Institute for Lifelong Education At Dartmouth) on gardening. It will have various speakers dealing with their particular fields of expertise. I will talk about Xeriscaping and Rain Gardens, which hold a special spot in my heart, as far as gardening in this age of conservation. It will keep me relatively busy through the winter as the course is being done in the spring.
My book is also in it's final stages, and I hope to announce the publishing of that to you sometime in this next year. Stay tuned!
By the way, if you haven't started preparing your evergreen shrubs for the colder weather, now would be the time to begin that chore. When you have a good day, spray some anti-desiccant on the leaves of your rhodies and similar broad-leaf evergreens. Be sure to get the bottom of the leaves as well as the top. An anti-desiccant is a liquid that kind of seals the pores on the leaves of the evergreens, stopping them from losing moisture. It will go a long way in keeping your shrubs healthy through the winter.
This is also the time to think about covering those same shrubs to protect them from heavy snow. Just remember it should NOT be plastic! The plants breathe, just like we do. We can't tolerate our mouths being covered by plastic...neither can the plant! Use burlap, or lathe, or some other breathable cover.