Apple-Picking

Yesterday was another overcast, austere day here.

We drove to a mountaintop orchard and picked apples in chilly, upper-40’s temperatures. The landscape has begun to look merely rusty to me — as it always does in the late fall.

We were picking apples for our yearly applesauce-making, and we read from the Handbook of Nature Study on the way to the orchard. I felt I’d never really looked at an apple before when I read Comstock’s directions for scrutinizing apples. I was glad we read the section, because I was able to see the little age lines on the apple twigs — something I’d never paid much attention to before. Each year when the scales drop from the buds, they leave these little ridges in the apple twigs.

We picked three bushels of Cortlands — one less than last year. (We still have about 6 quarts of applesauce left from last year.) Then we grabbed a few Northern Spies for pie and apple crisp.

We spied this little bird on our way to pay. When we got home we identified it as a yellow-rumped warbler.

It seems rather uncivil to name such a discreet, elegant little bird after its rump, but alas, we don’t get to decide.

After that we made apple crisp and watched squirrels, again, out the window. They are everywhere all of a sudden, and they look so compact and cozy wrapped up in their tails. My daughter took this picture, and since it’s better than any squirrel-pics I’ve taken, I’m posting it here.

It must be nice to carry a comforter everywhere you go, but I’m glad to have access to warm drinks and furnaces as the fall season settles in.

And, of course, apple crisp for breakfast.