Warblers and vireos and buntings, oh my! Birding enthusiasts and nature lovers, bring your binoculars and join us for the Blue Ridge Mountains spring migration birding weekend coming up on May 8-10, 2015, hosted by the Inn on Mill Creek B&B, a site on the North Carolina Birding Trail, Mountains Region.
| Color has reached 2,500 to 3,500 feet |
This week brings more color to our elevation (2,300 feet), and it looks like peak color at elevations around Asheville and Black Mountain, NC, will be happening over several days through the very end of October. As usual, we are still waiting on the oak trees! Gah! However, other tree types, such as sugar and red maples and sassafras, are beginning to change more rapidly. As it stands, this year’s predominant fall color is velvety gold, with birch, beech, hickory, sassafras and others providing different shades of yellow, bronze, and yellowish-orange. Early changers, such as sourwood, dogwood and sourgum are still showing color (mostly red hues) while tall tulip poplars are now bare after a rainstorm on October 14th caused their brown-tipped yellow leaves to drop.
| Fall colors are beginning to show at the Inn on Mill Creek B&B |
We’re in the second week of the “fall foliage” season here in Western North Carolina near Asheville, and the best color so far remains at high elevations, including peaks along the Blue Ridge Parkway. In particular, we recommend checking out Graveyard Fields, a valley that’s more than 5,000 feet above sea level, surrounded by tree-covered mountains. It’s a neat landscape that’s unique to the area. Graveyard Fields is named for tree stumps that dotted the valley after a devastating storm many, many years ago. The tree stumps are no longer there, but the fields are covered in early-changing shrubs, which you can traverse using boardwalks. The trails, which underwent upgrades this year, are pretty awesome at Graveyard Fields, with a waterfall hike included.
| Early fall color at the Inn on Mill Creek B&B |
Exciting news! Fall has most definitely arrived in the mountains of North Carolina. You know what that means…time to begin our annual tradition of weekly fall foliage reports for our area around Asheville, Black Mountain, Old Fort, Pisgah National Forest, and the Blue Ridge Parkway between Mt. Pisgah and Grandfather Mountain! Each Tuesday through the fall season, we’ll let you know which trees are changing and the best places to capture great fall color.
Looking for some incredible views when you visit the mountains of Western North Carolina? Combine a day of scenic driving along the Blue Ridge Parkway north of Asheville with an easy hike, such as the Chestoa View Trail (0.6 miles long).
Graveyard Fields, a favorite place for viewing wildflowers in the summer and fantastic foliage in early fall in the North Carolina mountains, is getting some upgrades this summer. It is set to reopen in July 2014.
With Spring just a week away, we’re daydreaming of warm breezes, verdant mountain vistas, wildflowers galore, spring songbirds and…well, we thought we’d go ahead and make a list of ten reasons to visit the mountains of Western North Carolina in springtime. What is there to see and do in Spring in the NC mountains?
| The road past the south lawn at the Inn on Mill Creek B&B |
It’s week three of our fall color reports for the North Carolina mountains and fall’s colors are starting to reach our elevation at 2,300 feet near Black Mountain and Asheville! As color descends from elevations above 4,000 feet, this is the week for yellow hues, as birch, beech, hickory, some sassafras, white ash and more start lighting up the ridges near the Inn. In addition to the golds, the reds of sourwoods, dogwoods and sweetgums provide a nice accent.
