Looks like fall is arriving in my part of upstate NY. [View all]

The leaves are starting to fall in earnest.

I usually have to do 5 or 6 passes over the season to get them all. I blow them into the street into huge piles, and then the Town eventually comes by and sucks them up before the snow flies. I'm assuming that's the way it works in the rest of the country as well.

So today was the first pass. Took a few hours.

I have a silver maple, a magnolia tree, a black walnut tree, and two weeping cherry trees.

I use an EGO battery powered leaf blower, and the thing is a beast. And best of all, it is quiet, so I don't piss off the neighbors. The batteries are 10 years old, and they are still holding up well, which makes me happy, because they are ridiculously expensive to replace.

It's another banner year for the black walnuts. That black walnut tree is huge, and when the walnuts fall that are higher up on the tree, they sometimes take some tiny branches with them on the way down. And those nuts hurt if one happens to bop you on the head. They are almost the size of tennis balls. You have to get to them pretty quickly after they fall, or they get fly strikes, and the resulting maggots.

I don't wear a harness when using the blower, so it was a good workout today in the fresh air.

Happy Autumn, and peace to all.