Windblown golden raintree lanterns

This morning I was astonished to find my driveway littered with little green lanterns -- seed pods that the golden raintree's falling flowers had left behind only days ago. Developing almost invisibly within  the tree's dense foliage, the little green pods had grown to their mature size in yesterday's steamy sunshine, and then sometime in the night a gusty rainstorm snapped their fragile stems and brought them down. In the fall, the pods that are still left on the tree will mature to a warm brown, resembling little lighted Chinese lanterns when backlit by the autumn sun.

Windfall of raintree gold

Two days and nights of gusty rainshowers have left drifted piles of fallen golden raintree blossoms along the edges of the driveway and beneath the old tree's massive, lichen-covered main trunk.

The tree has many branches still displaying their bright sprays of tiny flowers against the overcast skies.