Thursday, October 13, 2011

True Colors



It’s another rainy day though the sun shone for about five minutes—I’m grateful for every ray. We seem to have been in a pattern for a while now of two weeks of rain, a week and a half of sun, a week of rain.

On my walk yesterday, I noticed that more of the local leaves are showing their true colors. The reds, oranges and golds that autumn leaves display are the color they really are. The wonderful greens we see in the spring and summer are chlorophyll, the trees’ food; my botany instructor was adamant—“fertilizer is not plant food, chlorophyll is!” Since it’s produced by the sun, as the days shorten the chlorophyll recedes, displaying the leaves' gorgeous true colors.

The Tropicana Canna’s red and green stripes are especially gorgeous today. Though it hasn’t bloomed its anticipated orange flower, the colorfully striped leaves are a beautiful addition to my garden. If all goes well, it will survive the winter outdoors to grow again in the spring. The key to overwintering such plants outdoors is to keep watering them.

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