What a Difference a Week (or two) Makes

Things happen both slowly and quickly in the garden. In spring it seems like your plants are the tiniest seedlings for weeks with little noticable growth on a daily basis and then bam, there's a week where everything transforms and shoots up like mad. So it is in fall with the fleeting color. There was only about a two week period when the amazing Weeping Beech at Brooklyn Botanic turned gloriously golden and it was later than most trees in the garden. And then overnight it seemed, the leaves were all gone. Above as it was, mostly defoliated, this past Friday, and below on Friday, Nov 19th when it just changed color. It's particularly beautiful in a haunted way without leaves in the winter and early spring. In the cold season, it is all about this tree's weeping gnarled branches.