Drought conditions in parts of Tri-State Area threatening to impact fall foliage season
NEW YORK -- With a warming climate, leaves will generally change color later in the fall, but that's not the case this year. If you look around you'll find leaves revealing their true colors way too early.
CBS2's Vanessa Murdock spoke to an expert Tuesday to find out if leaf peeping season will be ruined by drought.
From green to so far gone far too early. It's August. The sun is blaring and folks are still sweating, but it seems the season has changed. Some trees boast the quintessential fall colors of burnt red and orange. That's exactly the case in Angela McQuade's backyard in the Rockland County village of Piermont.
"I was looking up at them and I was like, wow, that's kind of weird to see it changing so early," McQuade said. "It's not October."
Other trees look pitiful, as if they've given up completely.
"It's actually pretty crazy," said Louis Timpanaro, groundskeeper at Tallman State Park.
He said trees just keep shedding leaves.
"There's just leaves everywhere," he said.
Last August, he spotted no leaves on the ground, but that's not the case this year.
"I have to clean them up every single day," Timpanaro said.
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Melissa Finley, Thain Curator of Woody Plants at New York Botanical Garden, said this is the worst drought we've experience in a long time. The deficit since June 1 exceeds 4 1/3 inches and trees are stressed out.
"They're cutting their losses in order to prevent further water loss," Finley said. "We're getting a lot more leaf drop, a lot more leaf litter for this time of year than we see on average."
You can hear the difference via the crunching under your feet.
"When you have these severe drought conditions, you're going to start seeing metabolism ceasing almost entirely. That will cause leaf drop and the chlorophyll in the leaves to degrade," Finley said.
The early onset in metabolism ceasing does not hurt the tree, but protects it.
"Seems more like November. Makes me sad because I love fall. It's my favorite time of year," said Mary Morehead of Pomona, also in Rockland County.
But don't fret, fall foliage lovers. Finley said it's not too late to salvage this leaf-peeping season.
"No, nt at all. We're just going into September. If we get some good rainfall and, as we're going into September, we get some cool nights, I think we can still see some really good fall foliage developing," Finley said.
So not all is lost to the forest floor.
Finley said drought resistance is species dependent, so we could witness a more muted fall display if Mother Nature doesn't deliver drought relief.
