Interesting how the colour drains out of a landscape when you add cold. Cold really does feel blue.
After the rain everything greened up. (see below).
Then early this morning – our first hard frost.
Here are two photos from the same spot. I used the exact same filter / Portrait in the SnapSeed app (my fav to fix and reduce images) as the picture below, taken yesterday afternoon. Same POV but different light – that lovely afternoon after the rain light.
Then this one I took this morning. Dawn light. And cold. Frosted down.
With days of cold ahead I think that will be the end of the green green clover and bright orange leaves.
And with rain and wind; most of the leaves are down. I have never raked leaves – preferring to leave the leaves for the trees. They are loaded with nutrients. But today I will go out and clear the paths. Wet leaves are slippery. Wet leaves frozen solid to the footpath are an accident waiting to happen.
There is so much water in the air here that I am sure we will have lots of frosts for a while. Until it gets too cold to frost.
Frost is formed when water vapor in the air directly transitions into ice crystals on surfaces like wind-screens and plants. Cold air drops in layers. Warm air is lighter and rises with the breeze. These are called inversion layers. If you could see cold and warm like colours you would see the different temperatures laid one on the other like watercolored mist. Which is why I have a fan going in the glasshouse at night. Though the actual frost will not lay onto my plants the cold will and the fan disturbs that layer of cold mixing it with the warm above it, making sure it does not lay down onto my crops in there.
Tomatoes are very sensitive to cold so this will be interesting.
Jude and FreeBee watch with horror (or possibly glee) as Tima attempts to knock over the wheelbarrow just in case there is good stuff in there.
I swear- I take my eye off that pig for a minute … !
After the rain stopped I put fresh straw down for the white chickens.
Mostly I was writing yesterday.
And filming for our 10 minute SoundScape over at SubStack.
I am going out right now to set up a morning 10 minute Soundscape. I should have gone out before dawn but I was too cosy. I write this in my bed. Pillows up behind me. It is a little decadent but I begin so early. No-one wants to get dressed in the cold and go to the desk at 4.30 am. Modern technology being what it is – I bring my desk to my bed.
Have a wonderful day!
Celi
PS
🛵Only three more days left of the FREE for all 10 minute Farmy SoundScape. It arrives in your inbox at 5 pm each week night. This week’s work will remain free for all at SubStack forever. Thank you so much to all those new subscribers. Yay! Love you!
🛵Stand by for new Christmas Cards by our fellow reader Wendy, in Zazzle. (see in footer) Coming soon. 🦋😀
🛵Sign up for the newsletter (see in footer) coming out early in December with Sustainable Seasonal Tips!
The Kitchen's Garden 
22 responses to “Frost Snatches at the Colour”
lol. You say, “Tima attempts to knock over the wheelbarrow just in case there is good stuff in there.” So I look and all I see are several inches of rainwater in there while wondering… So – do tell Celi – did she? Get a nice dousing of icy rainwater, I mean? A fitting reward, hey?; )
She finds the Trump barrow hard to upturn. Though often it is full of cow shit. We call it the Trump Barrow because I bought it with funds from the pandemic payout. It means different things to different members of the household but I always grin to myself as I throw manure in it.
LOL! That is hilarious. I will never look at a wheelbarrow in the same way again!
😂
LMAO on your barrow’s moniker! And no great surprise it’s hard to uproot (and full of shite; )
Happy Thanksgiving from New England Cecilia.
Eunice!! And Happy Thanksgiving to you too!!
Trump barrow full of manure, perfect. I think l’ll get a Johnson, Truss, Sunak Barrow ! Writing in bed in the early morning, the best place to do it.
While the green is lovely I actually prefer that 2nd picture of the trees. There is just something about the misty, muted view that says time for a change and rest and renewal. Loved the white chicken video and watching them just fold up on themselves where they stand to have a rest.
They are so sweet the way they just gently plonk straight down. This is why I have to make sure the floor is dry for them. Lots of compost coming out of there!
I agree with your lovely interpretation of the 2nd picture’s trees… she has captured such a mood…
It’s getting colder here now – I might have to put a fleece on the vegetable soon.
I was just reading a book about farming in Extemadrura and the author mentions planting tomatoes quite deep to keep the roots warm, during cold Spanish winters.
That makes sense. Tomatoes will actually grow roots out of their stems.
One doesn;t normally think of Spain being cold, but it is quite mountainous and the get snow in Andalucia.
…they also pick tomatoes in December!
I would LOVE to still be picking tomatoes. But all my outside plants are quite dead.
I know, it is quite fantasic to think, that even in Catalunya, at this time of year, there are some red tomatoes growing outdoors. Even more amazing are the orange trees bearing fruit in December!
Delicious. I have not had a freshly picked orange in years. My mum said they got an orange in each of their Christmas stockings when they were kids – it was a real treat! She never forgot it.
My parents said the same!
Like I said: brother from another mother!
ROFL!
A big Yes! to planting tomatoes deep. I like to bury mine right to the topknot – as (like Celi said) they’ll grow a tonne of roots out of every inch below grade – just so much easier to keep them cool and hydrated through the heat of the summer and warmer long into the fall… : )
I write a lot in/on the bed too. I say on because it’s getting hotter and I tend to sleep outside the covers as I run hot. A nice small laptop = an anywhere desk, as you say. Of course, Husbands and doggos do cause jiggles and lurches, but it’s part of the process. Stay wam and cosy.