Plant Life in Arizona Mountains

     This fall, we took a trip to the White Mountains in Arizona.  (see other posts from this time) For those of you not familiar with the many micro-climates across the state, these pictures might surprise you.

     One venture was to the Little Colorado River, just outside Springerville. It was wet enough there to see poison ivy, a rarity in the southwest.  The autumnal colors were so spectacular, even the poison ivy had fall colors!  

    Another loop took us through forest roads and to Big Lake.  It was in this area that the one bluebell was photographed.  Interesting what is still blooming when the snap of real cold has triggered foliage change on other plants and trees.

     Biblical poetry is woven throughout, related to the photos.

Enjoy!

 Currant bushes and foliage. These grow well in the middle elevations of the southwest (4000-5000'). Above, shown with some fruit. Below, shown with brighter foliage in other places along the Little Colorado.

Poison ivy with some of that currant foliage and some green foliage from wild roses (see below)

"He has made everything beautiful in its time"  Ecclesiastes 3:11a  Even the poison ivy is decked out for fall.  Here it is shown with a tree/shrub, still green, that seems to be in the dogwood family.

Something from the dogwood family?  Notice the veins running near lengthwise, father than out to the "sides" of the leaves.  Hard to place exactly, due to purple berries, but there are western dogwood varieties.

A lot of the berries and fruit on these plants is a great reminder of a thought found in the Book of James:  Be patient, then, brothers [and sisters], until the Lord's coming.  See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the soil, being patient about it, until it gets the early [spring] and the late [autumnal] rains.  James 5:7

Wild roses and rose hips, the name for rose "fruit."  Roses are in the same family as cherries, apples, etc.   In mid to the start of high elevations of the southwest, especially where it's wetter, wild roses grow in beauty.  They look a lot like what are called "old roses", the first domestic forms of roses.

Thistles.  Beautiful, but check out the sharp spikes on the leaves.  A real reminder of when God cursed the earth because of humans' first sin, in Genesis 3:18:  "Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, yet you shall eat the plants of the field."  Fun fact-- artichokes are related to thistles, and their plants look like giant thistles!  (see also my much earlier posting by Martin Luther on his thoughts on the original creation, the curse, and the new creation.  he speaks of thistles)

 

Late bluebell, at Big Lake

Trees in Autumn

 As mentioned in other postings from this date, we recently took a trip to the White Mountains, in the far eastern part of Arizona, near New Mexico.  A different look for AZ, for those of you not familiar with the state, right?  Here is some fall foliage on the trees, some with evergreen mixed in. The colorful trees are quaking aspens, so named because their leaves shimmer at the slightest gust of breeze. They are a poplar, related to cottonwoods and Eurasian poplars.  Regarding evergreens, the elevation was high enough in spots to see Douglas-fir and true fir trees. I think there was some spruce around, but we didn't get photographs.

One of the travel loops took us to through National Forest and on to Big Lake, near Greer.  (see the other postings of this date) 

There is related Biblical poetry woven throughout.  Enjoy your fall, assuming you're in the Northern Hemisphere.  If not, enjoy your spring!  😉

In a high meadow, near some mountain tops in the White Mountains.  If you look closely, you see fire damage, which allowed aspens to grow.  Fire, though destructive and scary, is also "purifying."  It clears out the brush, which allows aspens to grow.  Aspens will not grow in the shade and requires these periodic clear-outs.  Then the aspens' root system anchors things so that erosion in minimized and other plant life can return.  

 

How long, O Yahweh? 

Will You hide Yourself forever?

How long will Your wrath burn like fire?  Psalm 89:46

 

[After the Flood, Yahweh said to Noah]:

"Through all the days of the earth,

Seedtime and Harvest,

Cold and Heat,

Summer and Winter,

Day and night

Will not 'take a sabbatical.' "  Genesis 8:22

Notice the rare red foliage on these aspens, near Big Lake, as above, on the way into the lake.  Typically, the foliage only turns a bright, golden yellow.  Some soils in isolated micro-environments allow the leaves to turn somewhat reddish.

[Yahweh says]:

"[The unfaithful] do not say in their heart:

'Let  us fear Yahweh our God,

Who gives rain in its season,

Both the autumn rain and the spring rain,

Who keeps for us 

The weeks appointed for harvest.' "  Jeremiah 5:24

 

  Be patient, then, brothers [and sisters], until the Lord's coming.  See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the soil, being patient about it, until it gets the early [spring] and the late [autumnal] rains.  James 5:7 

 

He has made everything beautiful in its time.  He  has also put eternity into [humanity's] heart, yet so that [a person] cannot figure out what God has done from the beginning to the end.  Ecclesiastes 3:11

 

Autumn Violets

 

Keep love for youth, and violets for the spring:
Or if these bloom when worn-out autumn grieves,
Let them lie hid in double shade of leaves,
Their own, and others dropped down withering;
For violets suit when home birds build and sing,
Not when the outbound bird a passage cleaves;
Not with dry stubble of mown harvest sheaves,
But when the green world buds to blossoming.
Keep violets for the spring, and love for youth,
Love that should dwell with beauty, mirth, and hope:
Or if a later sadder love be born,
Let this not look for grace beyond its scope,
But give itself, nor plead for answering truth—
A grateful Ruth tho' gleaning scanty corn*. 

  --Christina Rosetti; Macmillan's Magazine; NOV, 1868 

*Book of Ruth.  Landowners were required not to glean (gather grain crops) overly zealously; they were supposed to leave something behind for the poor.  Ruth, who moved from her home in Moab to Israel with her Israelite mother-in-law Naomi (after both were widowed), gleaned to support both of them.  The landowner eventually fell in love with her and married her; she became an ancestress of Christ.

Birds' Nests

 

"Temptations, of course, cannot be avoided.  But because we cannot keep birds from flying over our heads, there is no need that we should let them build a nest in our hair."  -- Martin Luther's Large Catechism,  "Explanation of the Sixth Petition" ("Lead us not into temptation.")

The Long View

 

"If I knew tomorrow were the end of the world,

I'd plant an apple tree today." 

(attributed to Martin Luther; 16th century German)  

O God, Our Help in Ages Past*

 

1. O God, our help in ages past,
   Our hope for years to come,
   Our shelter from the stormy blast,
   And our eternal home.
2. Under the shadow of Thy throne
   Thy saints have dwelt secure;
   Sufficient is Thine arm alone,
   And our defense is sure.
3. Before the hills in order stood,
   Or earth received her frame,
   From everlasting Thou art God,
   To endless years the same.

   

   Colorado Rocky Mountains

4. Thy Word commands our flesh to dust,
   “Return, ye sons of men”:
   All nations rose from earth at first,
   And turn to earth again.
5. A thousand ages in Thy sight
   Are like an evening gone;
   Short as the watch that ends the night
   Before the rising sun.  

   

   Sierra Prieta Mountains, Arizona

6. The busy tribes of flesh and blood,
   With all their lives and cares,
   Are carried downwards by the flood,
   And lost in foll’wing years.
7. Time, like an ever-rolling stream,
   Bears all its sons away;
   They fly, forgotten, as a dream
   Dies at the op’ning day.
8. Like flow’ry fields the nations stand
   Pleased with the morning light;
   The flow’rs beneath the mower’s hand
   Lie with’ring ere ’tis night.
9. O God, our help in ages past,
   Our hope for years to come,
   Be Thou our guard while troubles last,
   And our eternal home.  --Isaac Watts, 1708 (pub. 1719)

*A hymnodic version of Psalm 90.  (This Psalm and hymn are often used in liturgical churches on New Year's Eve, due to the discussion of "time.")

The Bright Morning Star

 This month, I'm making a departure to post something by David C. Brown, a "blog acquaintance" from the U.K.  He first posted it in July, 2016.  The link to his blog is below.

Thou art the Star of the morning;
Thou art the Bright Morning Star;*
Saints, in the midst of man's scorning
Welcome Thy light from afar:

Star of the morning,
O what a source of delight!
Soon Thou wilt have Thine assembly
Shining with heavenly light.  

Thou art the Star of the morning;
Thou art the Bright Morning Star;
Shining with heaven's adorning
Into the night where we are.
 
Star of the morning,
O what a source of delight!
Soon Thou wilt have Thine assembly
Shining with heavenly light. --David C. Brown, 2016

Sing it to  the hymn "Showers of Blessing"

*Christ as the Morning Star from the Book of Revelation.  (For more on this matter, see my posting, "Little Star, Might Star" from last month.)

The Bright Morning Star-- Grace Notes Blog