PSoTD

All the leaves are green, and stuck up on the trees...

THE NEW CLIMATE: LEGENDS OF THE FALL Seasonally adjusted trees staying green longer The Globe and Mail Ontario, Canada

Still, observers agree it's been one strange autumn, and the trees - some bare, some ablaze and others summer-green - tell the tale.

"I'm not an arborist, but I certainly have come to the conclusion that the colour-change season and the leaves on the trees are very different this year," said David Phillips, senior climatologist for Environment Canada in Toronto. "And I also know that it may very well be related to the kind of weather conditions that we've had this fall, because it's been very unusual."

October, with an average temperature of 14.3, was the warmest ever recorded in Toronto. The previous record high average for the month was 13.6, set in 1963.

"That's almost a full degree warmer than the previous warmest October," Mr. Phillips said. "I mean, in my business, we break records in 0.1 of a degree."

The normal average temperature for October is 8.9.

Further, there was no night cold enough last month to produce a killing frost, the key precursor to falling leaves, Mr. Phillips said. As of yesterday, there had been only five days this fall - one in October and the rest this month - on which the temperature dipped below zero.

"Typically, by this time of year, we would have 12 of those days," he said, including some far colder than we've seen thus far. "So we haven't had many frost days, it's been record warm, and that probably is answering at least part of the reason why we've had the kind of leaf situation we've had."

The fact that this year has been the driest on record also meant many stressed trees may have compensated by hanging on to their leaves for nourishment, prolonging the green season.

Mr. Phillips, who lives in Aurora, north of the city, is among the many getting antsy about whether his own leaves will drop in time for that city's last pickup, which looms on Monday.