Essay and photos by Joe Mish

August foliage provides the canvas upon which September begins to smudge and splash bright colors across the landscape. These scattered traces of color are the threads from which the blanket of full fall brilliance is woven.

As the earth squints at the sun, the decreasing daylength triggers a seasonal response, marked by visual changes in leaf color. The bold statement of color, expanding daily, by the hand of an unseen artist, fires the imagination of the human mind to dwell in a borderless realm of magic and possibility.

In the time before science, the wonders of the natural world were rationalized by myth, to satisfy the overpowering human curiosity, which demanded explanation. In a way, the periodic appearance of leaf color was a teaching aid to foster human survival by articulating the most critical elements of adaptation, creativity, and imagination.

The world that surrounds us is the catalyst for all we create, innovation is the product of imagination. Inspiration may be found in the least probable places, where the path of a fallen leaf on the driveway, leads directly to the starlit heavens and their impact on the earth and all living things.

I enjoy taking a paleo perspective to view nature and try to share the experience and emotion of my kindred paleo counterparts. Standing in their moccasins, I would come to realize a repetitive pattern exists which provides predictability, a key to survival and a reference point upon which to stack temporary facts. The appearance of color precedes the arrival of cold weather, a reminder to be prepared for snow and cold. See the colors of the sunset and rise, appear on the leaves. The overflowing colors are spattered across the landscape as the sun crashes into or escapes from the earth, to allow the colors of the sky to be held in your hand.

Summer has a home in September, so the transition to autumn is quite subtle, though hints of color stand out like small islands in the sea of green. While some specific trees and shrubs turn off the green, early in September, random species will always showcase a wink of color.

Black walnut trees are the first to turn yellow and shed leaves. They appear abandoned and leafless, while nearby trees are still veiled in green. The ground beneath the trees covered in a thick layer of yellow leaves, and laden with walnuts encased in thick green husks appear as if set on a yellow tablecloth for distribution and consumption by the local gray squirrels.

Staghorn sumac surrenders its green but retains its gold and red leaflets as adornments to compliment its dark brown hairy seed clusters. Many are already marked by white-tail deer bucks, scraping the velvet from their antlers.

Sassafras trees appear adorned in yellow or red, some leaves, in the shape of colorful mittens, as if displayed on a rack for sale.

American sycamore leaves are light green and edged with a golden brown as they begin to change in late summer. Their height and crown easily seen, especially when growing in groves along a watercourse is an obvious sign of changing seasons.

Native dogwood trees in late summer are adorned with faded reddish-purple leaves and bright red gleaming berries, which stand in contrast to each other and make this small understory tree, a fall treat to behold.

Black gum trees, found along the upper South Branch, are first in flight in their beech, birch, maple neighborhood association, as their obovate leaves, egg shaped with the broad end toward the tip, turn a rich salmon color and actually look like old fashioned Christmas lights.

Still, it is the random splash of color that catches the eye long before the great parade of fall color arrives. A single leaf of pumpkin orange appears among the dark green crown of an oak tree, as if signaling for rescue, afloat on an expanse of green ocean, five thousand feet below a search plane.

Unable to keep a secret, or simply out of step with the fall choreography, these colorful precursors are the sparks that light the autumn fire.

Author Joe Mish has been running wild in New Jersey since childhood when he found ways to escape his mother’s watchful eyes. He continues to trek the swamps, rivers and thickets seeking to share, with the residents and visitors, all of the state’s natural beauty hidden within full view. To read more of his writing and view more of his gorgeous photographs visit Winter Bear Rising, his wordpress blog. Joe’s series “Nature on the Raritan, Hidden in Plain View” runs monthly as part of the LRWP “Voices of the Watershed” series. Writing and photos used with permission from the author.