Not the fun kind of snow

More than a quarter million people lost power during this week's snow and ice storms, mostly due to ice-covered trees and branches falling on power lines. It'll be days before all get their power back. I feel lucky not to be among them, especially given the number of trees around my house.

 I took these photos today after the thaw started. That dark brown line at the bottom is my six-foot fence. Evergreen branches are designed to bend downwards under a load of snow. Then the snow slides off, unless it turns to ice. As temperatures fluctuated all week and we were bombarded with snow and balls of freezing rain, the layers of snow and ice alternated.

Those horizontal branches are the bamboo that normally stands straight. 

Little chicken house on the prairie. Several times I dug pathways to get there without my boots' filling with snow.

Private freeway.

Private potty corner.

And in the middle of the storm--

--one hibiscus blossom on my eleven-and-a-half year old plant, named The Death Plant because it was given to me when my husband died. 

Tree worries

Normally I write about animals but am posting my tree worries in the hope that someone who knows more about tree care than I (which is pretty much everyone) might offer helpful suggestions.

Yesterday’s rain brought down little fringy leaves from the tree whose trunk looks like the Whomping Willow at Hogwarts. I’ve seen leaves dry up and drop prematurely due to drought but this tree is neither dry nor drowned, so I don’t know what’s going on. Maybe somebody else knows why leaves would suddenly fall off in the middle of July? Could this be due to the sudden temperature change last week from 60 to a few days of over 90 degrees F?




In the same section of the yard, my droopy pine, which has been growing mightily, is turning brown. This began before last week. Last winter Miró dug one hole near the base of this tree but it was such a shallow hole that he didn’t even expose any roots. There has been no spraying or any other change around these trees.


The hydrangea isn’t too happy, either, but that problem looks like drought. The hydrangea is on a side of the house partly sheltered from this summer’s ample rainfall, so I watered it and will hope it isn’t protesting my having trimmed it back last winter.