I passed a lot of trees on my walk today. The St. Louis Parks department inventoried 14,469 trees in Forest Park, outside the Kennedy and Successional Forests (according to the 2005 report posted on the information board next to the Central Fields). When the forest areas are added there are over 17,500 - about 14% of the city’s total tree population. That’s a lot of trees. I managed to find some color still, even though the woods have slipped out of their summer garments and now stand naked in their winter coat (I was well covered by my winter coat). In the Successional Forest (where I found Charles perched in one of his favorite spots) there were some maples still showing off, but otherwise the leaves are brown and down. There was a shower of acorns from a nearby oak that sounded like hail (the hail that tore up my roof just 6 years ago, for instance), a redheaded woodpecker scolded me for something, and the starlings had a discussion group going as I wandered through. I made a big loop and then stopped into the visitors center before I went home. It was there that the above Yu-gi-oh trading card game was going on. It looked interesting, so I hung out for a bit to watch the action (I didn’t understand any of it, though). All of the photos are here.