Hello all I just joined because I came across this landscape and was quite curious about it. This was taken in the south of France, around November. As you can see, it's a perfectly ordinary looking valley, lots of green trees; except for a single one that is red. Now I assume the on red tree is a different variety than all the other ones and happens to change colors in autumn whereas the others don't. A few weeks later they were all red though. My question is: what variety of tree(s) could these be? I'm specifically asking because I want to use it as a plot device in a comic book I'm working on; where one tree turns red 1 or 2 weeks earlier than all the other ones. The story is set in the Pakistan region so if you know of any varieties there where this might apply, that would be most welcome too.
It could just be a different species than is typical to that area(possibly an invasive). Or just as likely an individual plant under stress.
I hope you are aware that southern France is typified by deciduous trees of different types, all of which exhibit a color change in the fall before losing their leaves. The red color change in common for oaks, which occur in the area. I am not familiar enough to definitively say it is oak forest, but likely to be some variety of deciduous tree native to the area. The early "turner" just experienced the trigger factors before the rest. My best guess, until something better comes along!
How sure are you that this red dot is a tree or trees? Looks as if it might be a burned-out or cleared area, or even a light source of some kind. Have you tried researching maps, etc. to see what human activity might be going on in this forest? As for the comic book, good luck to you! You might be interested in this comic book series featuring Muslim superheroes: http://www.the99.org/ As for the turning-red-early thing, as saltcedar and rlhs posted above, any plant that experiences stress (heat, cold, wet, dry, disease) or environmental triggers may change color early. Pakistani tree info: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_are_natural_vegetation_of_Pakistan Welcome to the Forum!
The poster indicated that all trees in the area appeared to have changed to the same colour over the next week or two, just to clarify.
Yes, I did read the entire post. This spot appears to be larger than the space one tree would occupy. As yet, I see no facts to negate the theory that this might be a burned-out area, clearly visible before surrounding trees changed color, subsequently masked when they did so. Just to clarify.
Suppositions and theories, supported by "facts" or not do not provide a real answer to anyone's question. Without actually going to the indicated site and collecting some empirical data, I'd rather try to minimize the possibilities rather than complicate the question further with off the wall suggestions. Hey....maybe Santa crashed his sled there, thus the large area of red........just to confuse the topic further...lol
A larger photograph would be helpful. Like others, I typically associate early leaf colouration with some sort of stress, but I suppose there could also be a genetic factor. that would advance the timing of colouration by a week or two. As for the chances of it being a single tree of a different species without any others in the entire landscape, I'd suggest that is rather low -- typically there is some sort of clustering to populations.
Thanks for your input so far! As I said, this "red dot" gave me an idea for a plot device and to be honest, it doesn't really matter which type of tree is in this picture. Tell me if this could work: someone decides to mark a spot in a forest by planting a tree that is of a different variety than all the others surrounding it. It would have to be a tree that, from a distance (like on the picture), would be indistinguishable from the others, but it changes colours (consistently) a few weeks before all the other ones and so for a short period of time, every year, the spot becomes visible. Also, it would have to be a tree that reaches at least 500 years of age. And, I have the general area of the Pakistan etc. in mind. I suppose I could just make up some trees, but it's more fun if I can provide an explanation that works. Anyone have any ideas / suggestions? (I also like the idea of "stress" confusing the tree. Is this something that could be controlled / artificially provoked?)
