Audio
Fall Colors
Transcript
Zion’s Zesty Colors
Autumn is my favorite time of year. From my childhood in western New York, it means apples and cider, sweaters and school days, sunny skies and crisp air. Most of all autumn means color. The world suddenly becomes more vibrant. The sky seems to turn a deeper, darker shade of blue, and green leaves slowly turn to bold new colors: crimson, burnt orange, and gold. Now, as a ranger working in Zion National Park, I find autumn is no different. The temperatures cool, the days grow shorter, and the colors change. And while the desert is not a place many associate with autumn colors, I believe it rivals New England any day. Against the blue skies and red rocks of Zion Canyon, the changing leaves are bursting fireworks of yellow, orange, and red. But why all these magnificent colors? And why now?
As I lazily lounge beneath the shade of a cottonwood tree near the Zion Lodge, I gaze at those shiny green leaves rustling above my head. They are absorbing almost all of what we call visible light, which includes every color of the rainbow. We see color because all objects in the world absorb and reflect different sections of the rainbow, and our eyes see what is reflected. The chlorophyll pigment in leaves absorbs all colors except green, so green is what we see. During spring and summer the cottonwood leaves are producing chlorophyll. But as the summer draws to a close, the shorter days and longer nights signal the plant to slowly stop producing that pigment. Luckily for us, that’s when the other pigments in the leaves become unmasked. Each green leaf will develop splashes of yellow and brown, a result of carotenoid pigments, present in the leaf all year but seen only in the fall after the chlorophyll disappears. Carotenoids give vegetables like carrots and corn their color and gradually turn all the cottonwood trees and box elders along the banks of the Virgin River into a vibrant gold. Because of another pigment called anthocyanin, produced only in the fall, the shiny green bigtooth maples along the Emerald Pools Trail will leisurely morph into crimson. Anthocyanins color fruits like apples and cherries. These are the pigments that paint the autumn landscape. Depending on the rainfall and the temperatures, Zion Canyon’s fall colors usually peak around mid-November.
Sitting under a cottonwood tree on a blistering 100 degree day, I find it hard to imagine it will ever be fall. Inevitably, though, the sun will rise a little later and set a little earlier. I will stop feeling as though I might melt when I walk out the door. And those shiny green leaves keeping me cool will slowly turn gold. Right now, though, as I lie beneath the fluttering leaves, I will keep dreaming about autumn, its cool temperatures, and its palette of colors.
Sarah Stio
Description
Discover what autumn is like in Zion as Park Ranger Robin Hampton brings to life an article written for the park's Nature Notes by Park Ranger Sarah Stio.
Duration
3 minutes, 53 seconds
Credit
NPS
Date Created
11/15/2011
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