A tendency to turn yellow

I’ve noticed that the leaves of Matelea reticulata, the pearl milkweed vine, have a tendency to turn yellow toward the end of the year (and occasionally at other times too). When I was photographing along Great Northern Blvd. on the overcast morning (hence the gray background) of December 3rd I came across this unusually vivid example, even to the point that the yellow was shading into orange. No one’s keeping score, but go ahead and add this to the series of late-fall foliage you’ve been seeing here for weeks. You can also add the fact that the darker little leaf came from a cedar elm tree, Ulmus crassifolia. Most likely the vine had recently been growing on a cedar elm but somehow became detached and took the leaf along with it. There’s also a possibility, though I think a less likely one, that the leaf fell off a cedar elm higher up and got caught on the milkweed vine on its way down.

© 2014 Steven Schwartzman