Don't Leaf Me This Way
For some of us, autumn stirs mixed feelings. Falling leaves, falling temperatures, cold rains and so forth remind us to prepare for the upcoming winter. They can get slippery after a rain, so watch your step. And those leaves keep on falling, getting into the rain gutters and on the lawn. People rake them up and put them in piles. Some cities allow them to be raked to the street to be picked up, and some clowns use half the street for their personal dumping ground, but I digress. Other people are able to burn the leaves, depending on where they live and whether doing so is a fire risk. Many people appreciate the fall foliage, often driving for many miles on a "color tour". Image courtesy of antpkr / FreeDigitalPhotos.net Why do the leaves come down? Why can't the doggone trees just hold onto the things, anyway? It would be less work for us, yes? Actually, there is a purpose to trees dropping their leaves. And a science, all the way down into a sequential gene co