• Thursday-What'sUP August 31 - 09:24 am

This time of year in the Keweenaw, there are usually subtle signs that fall is not very far off, but this year, the signs are boldly out there on display. Take a look at the trees in the background of this beautiful apple shot from Ashley Byykkonen, then front and center in the second shot. If I didn't know better, I'd guess these pictures were taken towards the end of September, beginning of October, but no sir, Ashley was out and about a week ago to capture these colorful leaves and apples. Early, yes. Why, I'm not sure, but have been told it has quite a bit to do with having little rain, thus putting the trees in stress, which contributes to the leaves putting on their colorful cloaks early. Even with less rain this year, it looks like Ashley has found a decent crop of apples hanging out.

Beautiful pics. With the drought we've been having doesn't everything seem to be a month or 2 early? What does the farmers almanac say about this coming winter? With Superior so low, and us getting more Lake Effect then actual snow???? Could be interesting......

Doesn't Lake Effect count as actual snow ??
Anyway heres what the Farmers say

Nothin like the sight, smell and taste of a good crisp autumn apple. Another reason fall is my very favorite season!

I'm with you Mskatie; fall is,also, my favorite time of year.
It looks, feels and smells like we will be having an early fall in Northern Il, too. The trees have started to change and am wondering if we will will have a color show or if the leaves will just drop off. We still have lots of standing water, but up until the last couple of weeks we had a abnormally dry summer.

Ditto on Fall!

Me, too, on fall!

I love fall also. I only wish winter didn't follow so closely behind.

Those apples look good enough for a scrumptious dutch apple pie. Yum, yum!!!

I saw a tree going red on my way in to work this morning, summer went too fast.

I'm a bit afraid of this winter. ;-)

record surface temps on lake Superior...

Any real cold snaps at all are gonna produce
a lot of Lake snow

It's been a great apple year. I stop on the way
home from work, pick apples and my wife makes the
house smell great by turning them into apple sauce and apple butter. ;-)

If Fall is arriving in the U.P, that means in about 3 weeks should be arriving here in east cental Iowa! It will be welcomed!

I can't wait for winter!!! I'm so pumped that it's almost here!!! Wahooo!!! :-) I love fall too! My favorite two seasons are right around the corner!

By the way Ashley, nice pictures! Great color and the apple looks really good! Keep 'em comin!

Deb I was thinking the same thing. I think I will have to make a dutch apple pie in the next coming month. I love fall cooking.

grand to see the colors tampa does not have such beautiful senery the apples remind me of apple cider and good old fashion apple pie grand picture thanks mary for this wonderful site i remain walter p

On the other hand, a snowy year might be good for business in the UP after a lack of snow for most of last year. Still, once the lake effect machine kicks in, it may be hard to stop!!

Doesn't Bobg has the life?? Picks apples on the way home so they can be made into "fresh" apple sauce and butter. I think the Dr. and I will move next door to share in the odoriferous nirvana eminating from the Gilreath house ;-)

Fall was my favorite growing up in Michigan. Sure do miss the colors. That's what drew me to this site in the first place. Pasty was the keyword to find it. Thank you so much for the memories.

I know this is a day early, but I will be heading out of town this evening. I would like to remember my Mom, Senia Lahti, who passed away last year on August the 9th. She has 2 more great grandchildren as of this past Spring.

My prayers are with Mary Drew and her family also, as she lost her mom on that same date, this year.

Thank you for the great pictures, Ashley & Mary! I especially like the apple ones. Fall color this early is a little scary. I have always heard that when it was dry, that the colors will be dull and the leaves will drop sooner. At this rate, the leaves will be long gone by October, I would think.

I love the great fall treats, like apple cider, homemade apple cobblers and apple pies, not to mention pumpkin pies, etc. Yummy! (Someone told me that Starbucks already has Pumpkin Spice Latte out, as of Tuesday this week. I don't drink Starbucks, but some of our displaced Pasty friends might.) The sad thing about fall for me is that means that winter is just around the corner. :-(

I was a Yooper - and still love snow - I am around the Detroit area now -- and we have not had a good winter for some time -- I am glad I read about colors starting early -- plan on making trip up home for the colors --

Lovely photos! The color is already good down here in Emmet County along Pleasantview Rd, and the apple trees are loaded. I made a deep dish apple pie this summer from an early mix of sweet and tart apples and a few pears, and on a whim added about one teaspoon balsamic vinegar to the mix before pouring it into the pie plate and topping it with crust. Gave it a whole new depth.

Lake Effect snow is a zero-sum game: pick it up out of the lake, drop it on the land, let it melt and run back into the lake. It doesn't add to the lake water, just moves it around a bit. What we need this winter is some good continental storms to dump a few hundred inches of snow onto us from the Pacific or the Arctic.

I also love the fall! When commuting between Marquette and
Jacobsville (before moving here) we went by a motel that would put
this up on it's sign in the fall:

Enjoy the colors ... white is next.

I always enjoyed seeing that!

And it won't be long before Dairy Queen has it's pumpkin pie blizzards. I don't like ice cream much, but those are delicious. I have a feeling that since the fall colors are drought-related, we'll be enjoying an extra-long fall. It can't get much better than that!

Therese:
Unfortunately lake effect snow is a minus sum game. It reduces lake levels. "At least half (of the lake-effect snowfall) is going to be lost into the atmosphere," said Roger Gauthier, a hydrologist with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Detroit. "It will evaporate right off of the snowpack and drift to the Eastern Seaboard."
At least the lake gets half of it back. That's better than what happens to most of the evaporation.

We recently bought some land up in the Keweenaw and one of the things I love about it, and the nearby area, is that there are so many "wild" apple trees. They are probably descended from some of the old varieties brought onto the farms years ago. Or grew as a result of someone's tossed apple core. They look smaller and tarter than newer varieties. Do any of you use them for cooking or baking? Also earlier I noticed a lot Juneberries. Any recipes for using those?

they dont call them jonathan apples for nothing. johnny appleseed was a real person, planting apple trees throughout the upper midwest so the early settlers could make hard cider.

If your from the U.P. then you know the answer to this question. What is worse then biting into a apple and finding a worm in it?

Fran in Ga.Put on your thinking cap on.Or someone from Da Bay may know too the name of the folks who had the Apple Orchard across from my Grampa Beanie, or Chechaulk's if that helps,before Wes built a home there? It's on the tip of my tounge.I go thru the alphabet and come up empty.
There was some good green apples in there! That is where I bite into one and found a half a worm.

I'm not from $bay, David H, but Granny Smith is a popular green apple for both cooking & baking. We don't use that variety because for some reason two of my sons get hives from just handling Granny Smith apples. That's not true for other varieties, and they love to eat other varieties.

BTW, on the way home from Saginaw today, we saw a pumpkin patch full of nice, large, bright orange pumpkins. They might be too big to be pie pumpkins, but they would be fine for jack-o-lanterns. I did not expect them to look so ripe yet. [I make pumpkin pies now from canned pumpkin. I had a mess one year, trying to cook down pumpkin pie filling from a whole pumpkin. I never could cook or bake it down far enough to get enough of the water out. Maybe it wasn't a pie pumpkin, but I had my fun once. I have better ways to spend my time. :-) ]

That's a great idea adding balsamic to your apple pie mix, Therese.
I'll have to try that this Thanksgiving. Sounds delicious.

Those beautiful red leaves make me ache for that crispness to the
air that only Fall brings with it. Not long now!

A great apple for cooking / baking is the northern spy. They are hard to find...no one plants them anymore as I understand they take 20 years to bear fruit. BUt if you can find them at some of the older orchards they are wonderful.

I usually like either Jonathans or Jonagolds apples for both eating and baking.

Fuji is my favorite eating apple. Finches like it too! I cut a fuji in
half and hung it near my finch feeders. They loved it!

Granny Smith my favorite for baking.

I woke up and the name of the orchard just came to me. Philup's,do you of that Fran?

Yeah, I never bite into an apple right off the tree. I peel them and cut them first. I, too, had a worm in one and it put me off the "raw" ones.
I do hope I can use these "wild" apples for something. They may have been part of an old farm, but it is very overgrown now. They do seem to be in rows on part of the land. But I've also found a few growing in a pine forest there, where you wouldn't expect them. I guess Johnny Appleseed did get up to the U.P.! Ah, vintage apples!

Hopefully a good sign for color when I get there
in 3 weeks.