Picture: hips on dog rose. Click here for more November berry and seed photos.
As foliage tints and falls, one notices shrubs that are still green. Ivy is an obvious example, as is garden privet - the species common in garden hedges. The latter can have some leaves turning yellow or slightly maroon and falling in November and December, but keeps most of them green throughout the winter.
The narrower-leaved wild privet gets a lot thinner as the winter goes on, sometimes with quite a lot of yellow tint in November and in December. But it usually retains at least some leaves (an exception being downland, where it often goes entirely bare).
Other shrubs which still have green foliage in November include bramble and buddleia. Bramble continues to lose leaves steadily during the month, with some turning yellow, gold, maroon or even an intense red, but it still retains quite a lot of green foliage, particularly in sheltered spots.
Buddleia has often shed a lot of its leaves in August and September, many turning yellow in the process. Meanwhile in September or early October it is also producing the green shoots of next year's leaves. In November there can still be some large leaves left on the plant - presumably this year's but just possibly new shoots that have managed to grow a bit before the cold sets in. By the end of the month many buddleias just have small new shoots, however, which will stay this way, without further growth, until March.
Woodland tendrils of honeysuckle can also have new leaf shoots from early in November, though generally they do not do this until December. Honeysuckles in more suburban settings may not go bare at all and can even still be showing the occasional flower early in the month.
On other shrubs some foliage can linger on. Some hawthorns and blackthorns lose all their leaves in October but others hang onto some - tinted or even still green - until late in November, or even into the first days of December.
Dog rose can likewise be reluctant to let go of its last few remaining dribs of foliage, which can linger green or yellowy-green into December. Elder may hold onto a few leaves throughout the month, even though most are completely bare by now.
Dogwood can also keep some leaves (green or an attractive deep maroon) into the first half of November, occasionally even later, and once it sheds, its twigs are a bright maroon colour too. Bizarrely, even as it is shedding leaves it can still have some flowers or flower buds: you sometimes even see flowers on bare twigs.
Other shrubs which may still have foliage include spindle, which can sport an attractive mix of colours - golds, yellows and pinks - or still have mainly green leaves, and forsythia, which has yellow and maroon tints till late in the month. In the first half you may see some remaining reddish leaves on guelder rose, while on wayfaring tree a few might last into December.
Bracken can still have some yellow or gold tint into the first half of November - or even fronds that are still green: mostly it has turned brown by now, however; sometimes a rather nice coppery colour. Its plants are still full erect at this stage, but as the winter goes on they will die back to the ground.
Travellers joy can still have a lot of foliage into December, turning at best a pale yellowy-green. Russian vine also stays green and keeps some foliage well into the winter. Snowberry loses its leaves inconspicuously (and often quite suddenly) as leaf fall comes to an end, mainly shedding them green but sometimes with some shrivelling.
Berries
Once leaves fall, the remaining berries become very visible and prominent, though as the month goes on more and more are consumed by birds, mice or squirrels.
This is true of haws on hawthorn (a favourite food of redwings and blackbirds) and sloes on blackthorn, though in both cases you can find bushes with quite a lot of berries even late in the month. These tend to be going over, however, turning maroon in the case of haws, and going black (if they have not already done so in October) and shrivelling in the case of sloes.
Hips also remain prominent on the bare branches of dog rose. Some (most?) will remain there all winter, whether because they are inedible, unpalatable or inaccessible, I do not know.
Other berries you can see include the bright red ones of holly, which are at their best this month, the fluted pink ones of spindle, and the bright red strings of black bryony. A few rowan, guelder rose and whitebeam berries may survive even after their foliage is gone, and you can occasionally see the red ones of bittersweet (aka woody nightshade), particularly early in the month.
Black berries that you may just come across include those of dogwood, tutsan and privet (usually wild privet, though garden privet is possible). Ivy berries are still green, with a cap that is usually brown in November but may just turn greyer towards its end.
Note also the pods of berry-like, red-orange seeds of stinking iris (often, though not exclusively, found on lime soils) on a plant whose fronds look a bit like oversized daffodil leaves.
In gardens and semi-wild situations firethorn (also known as pyracantha) still sports its bright orange or red berries. Despite having apparently ripened in late August, it is only now they start to be targeted by birds (one theory is that the birds go for the more perishable berries such as haws and sloes first). Possibly as a result, a few berries fall to the ground.
Cotoneaster, another garden escapee, has had some of its berries on the ground since mid October, and this continues during November. Both species are a particularly popular food with migrant flocks of redwings and fieldfares, though native thrushes, blackbirds, wood pigeons and crows also go for them.
The red berries on female yew trees also continue to fall to the ground as the month goes on (or get eaten by birds, who can consume the fleshy outer part while passing the poisonous seed through their guts intact): often they are gone by mid month, though some may remain on the tree later.
Snowberry has white spherical fruits which stay on the plant all winter, and are very noticeable once the leaves fall (which is sometimes not till early December).
On heathland gorse can sport some yellow flowers, though this varies widely from bush to bush and place to place, while in gardens winter jasmine shrubs burst into blooms of the same colour - usually later in the month after it has lost its leaves, but sometimes earlier, while some foliage is still there.
Winter flowering cherry trees bloom in gardens and suburban streets late in the month too. Don't confuse this with viburnum farreri, a pink-flowered garden shrub that can start to produce pink flowers even early in November while it still has leaves, and holds onto them even once the leaves have fallen later in the month.
The more normal viburnum, also a garden shrub, has white flowers, which it continues to produce in its half-hearted way this month (some flowers out, some going over or not yet open).
What look like flower buds on rhododendron are clusters of leaves waiting to open in spring: these distinguish it from cherry laurel, though very occasionally the latter may start to produce very tiny flower buds this month, something it does not normally do till late December. You can also see last year's seed cylinders on rhododendron, which start the month green but tend to be shrivelling and going brown by its end.
Draped over hedgerows on chalk soils, old man’s beard, the seed of traveller’s joy, now for the most part has the fluffy appearance that gives it its winter name. It seems much more abundant than the plant's flowers were in July and August.
Seeds and catkin buds on trees
Falling leaves reveal seeds and catkin buds on trees. Hazel has in fact had new catkin buds, 1 to 1.5 centimetres long, on its twigs since July, and during the month they start to transition from green to beige in colour. Then will not lengthen into the characteristic yellow lambs tails till late January or February, however.
Likewise the catkins buds on alder - also formed in summer and now about 3 centimetres long and green, brown, maroon or (rarely) pinkish - will not flower till February. Its new seed cones turn from green to brown (and then open to release their seed) in the first half of the month, if they have not already done so in late October. They then become indistinguishable from last year's cones, which are still on the tree.
Birch has catkin buds which will not flower until late March or early April: they look brown from a distance, but close up you may see that they are green flecked with brown. The tree may retain some of its dried brown seed cylinders even after leaf fall.
Other trees retaining seeds after leaf fall include female ash trees, which have bunches of desiccated brown "keys", and limes, which still have some of their winged fruits: both can hold on to them throughout the winter.
The same is true of open nut cases on the twigs of beech trees and the spherical seed cases of London planes. The latter continue to turn brown during the month if they have not already done so in late October. This is very variable in timing from place to place, however, and even at the end of the month you can still seem some which are quite greenish.
Sycamore can also keep bunches of dried seeds on bare twigs (it is easy to confuse them at a casual glance with ash seeds), and you can sometimes see this on field maple, hornbeam or (much more rarely) Norway maple.
Early in the month a few fallen acorns and the spiky seed cases of sweet chestnut may be evident on the ground, but they soon disappear, either getting eaten or trodden into the mud. Also early in the month some apples may remain on the bare branches of garden trees, as indeed may a few crab apples on wild ones: otherwise you may see a thick skirt of fallen crab apples around a particular tree.
Mistletoe is visible in trees once their foliage is gone, usually on poplar and lime, though sometimes also on apple, maples or hawthorn: its glassy white berries are a favourite food of mistle thrushes, hence the bird's name, though overwintering blackcaps are also partial to them and apparently quite instrumental in the spread of the plant these days.
Roe deer like mistle berries too - when they can get reach them, which is not often: that is why you don't usually find mistletoe close to the ground. Don't confuse mistletoe with the remain of birds nests, which are also visible once the leaves fall: it is interesting to see what sites the birds chose.
More November pages:
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