Fall Photos from Rio Concho West

I love the fall; it is without a doubt my favorite time of year. Since returning from our trip, Donna and I have had several nice days where we could work in the yard and then sit on our patio, enjoying the soft breezes and lazy days.

I thought I'd share some photos with you.

As I've noted before in my blog, we are fortunate to have a number of animals in our area. We are blessed with quite a few beautiful deer, and we have numerous turkeys that seem to think they own the place. We have some other critters as well, some welcome and some not, but the turkeys and deer are my favorites.

The turkeys seem to be growing bolder, and they do not seem to be as skittish as they were when we first moved here. A few mornings ago, Donna spotted a large group moving through our back yard. I snapped the following photos through the window. The first picture is framed by the slats of our blinds.

There are 11 turkeys in our yard, and an additional 5 across the street in another yard.

I zoomed in on these 2 hens for a good, clear shot.

To show you just how bold these rascals are becoming, here is a shot Donna took a few days ago.

This is the house across the street from ours. Notice the turkeys roaming the roof. I count 6.

Every year, there are a couple of trees down the street that really show good color. Admittedly, we don't have a lot of fall color in this part of the state, so what little we have, we cherish.

Pretty color in someone's back yard near our neighborhood church.

Tree on the side of someone's house.

When we returned from our recent trip, Donna and I both noticed the good color of the bur oak in our front yard. We just couldn't remember it being as pretty the past 3 years. I snapped several pictures of it over the next few days. I'm glad I did, as the leaves are now all gone due mainly to heavy winds the past couple of days.

Bur oak in our front yard. I snapped this upon our return, before any of the leaves began falling. Note how leaf free the yard is.

Frontal view of our bur oak.

Close up of bur oak that shows the yellow color a bit better.

You can see the leaves on the ground in this picture. The color had pretty well faded, and the leaves were beginning to fall fast. In another day, all of the leaves would be gone.

I love the sunrises and sunsets in the west. There is a narrow window of time to really catch the beautiful color of a great sunrise/sunset, and I usually miss that window. The pictures below were all taken one morning over a short period of time. The color looks different in some photos either because I zoomed in or because of time passing.

Light was just beginning to break on the eastern horizon. Notice the clouds.

This picture was snapped just a few seconds later, but I had zoomed in a bit (note size of trees in left half of picture). As a result, this picture looks to have a bit more orange tint.

Just a short time later, I zoomed in even more and focused on the sky. More orange tint in this picture as a result.

This is the last picture I snapped. I zoomed out to capture everything, including the vapor trail of a plane from upper right slanting diagonally down left.

As with most of Texas, we were hit by a frigid cold front yesterday. When we awoke, the temp was in the mid to high 60s. By noon, we were down to about 45. By dark, the temp had fallen to 35. There has been little moisture, though, so no ice or snow. That north wind really makes the wind chill bitter. Hope you are snug and warm wherever you are.