The fruits of fall

Fall is falling fast around here. We've had some below-freezing nights and are cutting firewood and harvesting the garden like mad (which accounts for my silence here on the blog -- I'll have a harvest update in the near future).

But it's not just the garden that's putting out fruit. The wild plants are producing abundantly before the first snow falls.

The rose hips (rich in Vitamin C) are very abundant this year.

The elderberries are ripe as well.

The wild honeysuckle put out some startlingly florescent-orange fruit.

Lots and lots of snowberries this year.

These are berries from our Virginia creeper vines. The wild birds gorge on them.

With the exception of the rose hips and elderberries, the other fruit may or may not be edible -- or only edible in small quantities. They taste yucky anyway, so none of us bother harvesting any of them (we have no shortage of fruit from the garden).

The fall colors have been especially vibrant this year too. Of course we don't get the explosive jubilee of the east coast deciduous forests, but the undergrowth turns lovely shades of orange, red, and yellow.

As I said, I'll have updates on our harvest and wood cutting in the near future. Right now we're too busy harvesting and wood cutting.