False Autumn in Barnes and Mortlake
Our trees are hurting - story 129
Even for those who relish the turn of the seasons — and I count myself among the lovers of a long summer — this is a troubling sight.
Walk through Barnes or Mortlake and you cannot miss it. Pavements and greens are already carpeted with leaves, weeks before autumn should begin. There are leaves everywhere. And have been for several weeks.
Notes & thoughts
Here’s the thing. These trees are not dropping their leaves because the season is changing, they’re doing so because they are experiencing stress.
The Sunday Times ( ££ paywall) reported
Leaves are full of holes to allow carbon dioxide to enter, but in doing so water vapour can escape.
When a tree is experiencing drought for a prolonged period of time, it’s genetically programmed to shed its leaves prematurely, effectively blocking up the points at which is escaping to conserve its supply.
This is cause of our ‘false autumn’.
Trees and plants start to behave as if the season has change, even though it is still summer.
The Met Office has confirmed that summer 2025 is officially the hottest on record for the United Kingdom. It is in line with evidence that summers are getting hotter and drier because of climate change. The early leaf fall across Barnes and Mortlake is simply the local face of that wider reality.