(another cold read on a geometry book)

Right. I get to do this because I'm qualified for it.


Some people would now be telling me that I should have been more careful about admitting/displaying my skills. But while it's not my favorite thing, I don't mind doing plane geometry as a break from the science books, and it needs doing.

(another cold read on a geometry book)

Right. I get to do this because I'm qualified for it.


Some people would now be telling me that I should have been more careful about admitting/displaying my skills. But while it's not my favorite thing, I don't mind doing plane geometry as a break from the science books, and it needs doing.

Phenology: cherries

Walking home a few days ago, I heard a bird singing in a tree. I looked up, hoping to see the bird. Instead, I saw cherries hanging from the high branches.

That shouldn't be surprising. Cherry trees grow cherries, right?

I've lived in this neighborhood since 1987, and walked past that tree thousands of times, at all seasons of the year. cattitude and I went and took a look this evening, and there are lots of cherries hanging from the branches, high and fairly low. The fruit is still quite small, of course.

My only guess so far is that cherries aren't self-fertilizing, and this year pollen from another tree, possibly the relatively young weeping cherry across the street, fertilized the flowers on this tree.

Another odd aspect of this: When we moved in, this tree had two different colors of flower, on different branches. Some years ago, for either medical or aesthetic reasons, the nuns whose building it grows outside had the grafted-on branches removed, so now all the flowers are white. If my hypothesis above is correct, I don't know why the grafted-on pink branches didn't cause the tree to set fruit, nor yet bear fruit themselves.

Phenology: cherries

Walking home a few days ago, I heard a bird singing in a tree. I looked up, hoping to see the bird. Instead, I saw cherries hanging from the high branches.

That shouldn't be surprising. Cherry trees grow cherries, right?

I've lived in this neighborhood since 1987, and walked past that tree thousands of times, at all seasons of the year. cattitude and I went and took a look this evening, and there are lots of cherries hanging from the branches, high and fairly low. The fruit is still quite small, of course.

My only guess so far is that cherries aren't self-fertilizing, and this year pollen from another tree, possibly the relatively young weeping cherry across the street, fertilized the flowers on this tree.

Another odd aspect of this: When we moved in, this tree had two different colors of flower, on different branches. Some years ago, for either medical or aesthetic reasons, the nuns whose building it grows outside had the grafted-on branches removed, so now all the flowers are white. If my hypothesis above is correct, I don't know why the grafted-on pink branches didn't cause the tree to set fruit, nor yet bear fruit themselves.