OT:Fall Colors.......

Is it just me or does it seem that leaves are changing rather early this year? I was driving through town yesterday and noticed several Maples have already started turning orange. Several other trees are turning yellow, and I live at 5000ft.

I haven't gotten to head up in the mountains for a couple weeks but friends of mine that live in Walden told me that they have had frost for every day for the past 2-3 weeks.

Are the aspens already starting to turn from this amazingly mild summer?

Hopefully my scheduled vacation at the end of September will not be too late.

1 week ago in the Poudre canyon there were some trees along the river already changing. Looked like cottonwoods from afar.

It's not just you.
Down in the southwest corner of the state, my ornamental grasses have sprouted seed pods two weeks early.
Saw one cottonwood tree with yellow leaves yesterday, and that doesn't happen 'til the end of October! Frost was reported in Mancos last week, and a storm that roared through here several days ago left a dusting of snow on the LaPlata Mtns.

I'll try and get up to the Telluride area this weekend for a look-see.

On my road trip back from Washington two weeks ago, we saw trees changing in the mtns of central Washington and there was heavy frost two mornings in the Tetons. It sure feels like an early fall to me. I have a box elder in my backyard that is changing now.

I was on Pikes Peak today and was paying particular attention to the aspens... I didn't see anything changing. In fact, there are still wildflowers in bloom right up to treeline.

I've got a few yellow leaves in my trees here in Taos and have heard reports today from a USFS employee that aspens in our high-country are beginning to change.

The La Sals have a few yellow willows and aspens, and pockets of scrub oak starting to turn orange.

Ah, time for the annual "The Colors Seem to be Changing Early This Year" thread! Although, I must admit, like Bryan, I saw those cottonwoods changing bigtime in Poudre Canyon last Monday and thought it a bit odd. Must be global warming -- er, I mean, climate change. (Where's the ROTFLMAO emoticon when you need it?!)

I suspect things will generally keep the historic timeline, with pockets of variation. It's not uncommon for the aspens between Creede and Lake City to be at peak by mid-September, while all the other San Juan destinations wait till late-Sept/early-Oct.

HA!! i swear i was just thinking of when this same topic appeared last year (although if i recall it was a week or so later) and Todd immediately jumped in of course Too funny, i agree wheres the LMAO icon! One thing is true though about this year--the monsoon didnt really happen in July-Aug the way it 'normally' does, and as a result Western Colorado was very dry (Eastern CO was wet!) and without the moisture, we have definitely been seeing cooler nights the past few weeks--Alamosa for example set a few record lows--that may be contributing to early foliage change. It may be humorous to some, but Global Warming/Climate Change does affect large scale weather patterns, who knows if it has "caused" the recent patterns, but what I have heard anectodally from long time residents is that the more recent weather patterns are far different than what they recall from earlier years--course people have short memories.

9News carried a report last night that suggested that the colors are changing 1-2 weeks early this year. It's certainly been a different summer than usual.

I was under the impression that the primary factor for when fall color occurs is length of day (or night), and that temps, rainfall, etc. only modulate the date slightly. It'd be interesting if some of the long-time residents of this forum could go back through old images and extract the peak color dates for given locations. Post 'em here (if the moderator approves) and we could probably come up with an average date for peak color. Could even correlate with climatology data I suppose. I'm guessing the data would follow a nice Gaussian distribution. [Sorry - the engineer in me pops up every once-in-awhile.]

Anyway, an average date (I almost said mean date - but that could have several meanings Now that I think about it, so could 'average date' ) might be useful for newcomers and/or people traveling to the area in hopes of catching some color.

Heh, I can't believe that I started the annual "Are we there yet" thread.... Hopefully things will play out like normal if they don't there are always places that seem to turn colors as others ones are losing their leafs.

Jim, thanks for starting the thread for fall foliage. As I was walking the Highline Trail on Thurs., fall colors were beginning to show on cottonwoods and others. Its fun to make the mental shift from summer flowers to fall foliage even tho there is an overlap like baseball to football.

Bill Brennan

I hope the colors don't come early. As a photographer from Austin, I have to make plans months in advance and we'll be in the San Juans from Sept 29-Oct 4th. :-(
I will be following this thread with much interest.

Rob

Don't despair Rob, I've been in the San Juans around Sept 29th-Oct 4th for the past 2 years and have found that to be a tad bit too early for peak colors in that region. So if things will in fact be early this year, maybe it'll drop perfectly for you.

Yesterday I saw a maple in an office park as red as a fire engine and I thought I was tripping.

I saw a couple of aspens that had just a few yellow leaves when I went over Monarch Pass for my move here to Gunnison. I am off tomorrow and Monday, am hoping to check out Kebler pass, since that is probably the 1st place i will be going this fall. Will update if I end up going that way.

course people have short memories.

Bingo!

I have one changed leaf on my aspen trees on my property. I've been in this house for 19 years and it seems like business as usual, premature colorlation in 1% or less of leaves. The remaining trees drink too much Corona, so they usually change a month later, being more laid back and relaxed.
I have lost a number of aspen over the past 2 years, young ones and old ones, with very few suckers coming up. They just seem to be drying up, although this summer, overall, was the wettest one I've experienced since living here.