Hello Gardeners, I’m Amanda McNulty with Clemson Extension and Making It Grow. Hickories, tulip poplars, catalpas, gingkoes and other deciduous trees owe their yellow and golden fall colors to the presence of chemical compounds called carotenoids and flavonoids that served as accessories to the life-giving cycle of photosynthesis that takes place in green leaves. Now that the shorter-lived chlorophyll molecules, responsible for the green color in leaves, are declining in concentration, these longer-lived compounds are becoming visible to us. We can pretty much count on having yellows with orange hues added in our woodlands and in shade trees in our yards. The colors are more vivid and will last longer if we’ve had adequate rainfall and the leaves have had time to develop an abscission layer between the base of the leaf’s petiole and its attachment to the stem. In years when we have drought, the leaves have premature death from lack of water and simply turn brown.
What Gives "Fall Color" Its Colors?
