Munich awash in carotenoids, too

Have you seen the Fall Color in NYC photographs on our Facebook page?  The numerous honeylocusts, green ashes, and London planetrees in our NYC neighborhood are full of yellow and orange leaves.  The leaf pigments responsible for this coloration are carotenoids.  (Red and pin oaks show brown leaves in the fall as tannins are revealed with the breakdown of carotenoids and chlorophyll.)  Most trees in Munich are also exhibiting yellow fall color.  A friend commented that she missed the red fall color so common in the U.S. northeast.

Horse chestnuts (Aesculus hippocastanum) are brilliantly yellow along museum row near the Technische Universität München.  A row of street trees in the neighborhood near the Theresienstr. U-Bahn (subway) station are not to be outdone.

A willow (Salix) growing along Kleinhesseloher See (Kleinhesseloher Lake).

And a European beech (Fagus sylvatica) near Karolinenplatz is colored bronze!