“Nature amazes me still. Some changes are so gradual that you barely notice them while others happen in the blink of an eye.”
– Ed Lehming

Last week I took a much needed break at lunch and headed for a quick walk through the woods at North Walker Woods. For those who follow regularly, you will know that this is a place I like to go to quite frequently. It’s close to home, the trails are well maintained, and it offers me a broad profile of southern Ontario forest flora. It’s also fairly open, so bugs are not too intense.

I was just there last week enjoying the multitude of trilliums and other wildflowers and the forest was just beginning to show its spring flush of bright green, yellow, and red emerging leaves. The forest was still very open and bright, allowing lots of sunshine to reach the forest floor and feed the delicate spring flowers. This ‘open’ spring forest and its delightful colours was shared in my “Trillium Trails” post only a few days ago.

As the title of this post states, what a difference a week makes. With a few warm and sunny days, the entire forest is now in full leaf. It’s also quite surprising how many trilliums are still in bloom, largely due to the cool weather we had up till a few days ago. They have already started to turn the pink-magenta colour that is their final phase of blossom and soon they will be replaced by ferns and other deep green undergrowth as the forest settles into summer mode.

It’s been a wonderful extended spring on the trails this spring, with almost all the spring ephemerals blooming at the same time and remaining in bloom for close to two weeks. A highly unusual but delightful season, yet things must progress and I am thankful for these times.

Nikon D800
Tamron SP AF 90mm f/2.8 Di Macro 1:1 (272ENII)@90mm
1/50 sec, f/11.0, ISO 400

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