Scientifically speaking, it is the 23.5-degree tilt of the earth that gives us our seasons, and in autumn, that tilt takes us away from the sun. We experience this shift as shorter days, longer nights, and cooler temperatures – the start of fall. As the heat of summer gives way to the cool of autumn, you may feel a call to be out into the natural world – and go for a walk in the autumn woods.
Being in the woods in autumn can sometimes be a little overwhelming. Mother Nature puts on such a grand show that it’s difficult to know where to look first. There is color everywhere, from the tops of the trees that are still retaining their leaves to the forest floor carpeted with the multicolored leaves that have let go.
Enchanting Sounds of Autumn Woods
I love the sounds of the woods in autumn. The rustling of the leaves underfoot. The snap and crack of twigs and branches hiding under the carpet of leaves. The trees swishing and creaking in the wind. The occasional caw of the crow, the jeer of the blue jay, or the whistle of a red-shouldered hawk (which might in fact be a blue jay mimicking the red-shouldered hawk).
Seasonal Delights
Each season has its delights-spring and summer with the wafting scents of flowers, winter with its crisp clean smell-but one of the most delicious is in the woods in autumn.
Not only are woodland paths beautiful with their multi-hued carpets of leaves …the scent in the air is spicy-sweet, but a smell also particular to fall. You can sniff, sniff, sniff, trying to place the smell, as though you are in an exotic spice shop, but it is just the smell of the fall woods.
Multi-Sensory Delight
There is the visual beauty of colored leaves above and below, the amazing aroma, and the sound of my feet brushing through the drying leaves; that sound reminds me of a childhood delight: crashing through large piles of fallen leaves in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park, scattering them, tossing them, a raucous celebration of the season.
The color is fleeting; the paths will soon be dull. The special scent of this season’s woods will become a memory, as the cold and quiet of winter begins to set in.
By Bob Curtis
(With help from the following Blogs – “Autumn in the Woods”; “A Walk in the Woods: The Scent of Autumn”; “Your Woods in Autumn: Top Things to See”)
