The woods around the mountain have closed the green curtain. Just a few weeks ago the view into the forest from Fouche Gap Road was open. Now the trees have leafed out and all that’s visible is succeeding planes of green. I suppose the view is somewhat more open if you walk into the woods, but every plant is greedy for sunlight, so they wall in the open road with leaves.
Every level of the forest is green, from the ground up. The upper levels and the understory trees are green. The muscadine vines are green. Even the beds of poison ivy are so lush and that they look almost inviting.
This is the view from Fouche Gap Road back in December. It wasn’t so very different a few weeks ago.
This is a view from almost the same place taken Friday. It’s a view looking up the mountain. This particular location doesn’t have as much lower growth, so the view is less obstructed.
The leaves are so new some trees haven’t quite finished filling them out. The maples seem to be behind the oaks, with the hickories somewhere in between. But even the oak leaves are still soft. I cut a couple of chestnut oaks close to the house and within a half an hour the leaves had wilted like frozen lettuce.
Walking down the mountain in the cool of the morning with the birds singing somewhere out of sight is uplifting. It’s easy to understand why humans associate spring with rebirth.
I love the comparison photos. Such a huge difference. I had forgotten how forests of deciduous trees look in winter, so open and quite beautiful Here in the land of evergreens, the view pretty much stays the same.
Robin Andrea — The difference is remarkable in a deciduous forest, isn’t it? Although there are quite a few pines on the mountain, especially on our property, most of the forest that Fouche Gap Road goes through is deciduous, so the change is dramatic as you go up and down the mountain.
I took the winter photo one day as I was walking the dogs because the light-colored trunks were so striking in the morning sun.