342 ] Trees and How to Know Them 



"factories" secure the materials with which they work. Put a leafy 

 twig into ink and you will see how the color is carried up through 

 the wood into the leaves. The minerals and water taken from the 

 earth by the rootlets are carried in much the same way up the 

 larger roots, on up into the sapwood of the trunk, and out through 

 the branches and twigs to the leaves. 



When you look carefully at the leaves you can see many veins 

 that serve as channels for spreading water and minerals. From 

 these raw materials, and with the help of sunlight, the leaves 

 produce a sugary liquid that travels back to the trunk and through 

 the fibers of the innermost layer of bark to all parts of the tree 

 to nourish it. 



The work of making food and distributing it, goes on through- 

 out the spring and early summer. By midsummer the tree has 

 achieved most of its growth for the year and it can begin to store 

 extra food in its trunk, branches, twigs, and roots. During the 

 winter the tree rests; the following spring the reserve food is avail- 

 able to help buds open and new leaves can begin to grow. 



The Most Famous Tree Food of All: At this point maple sugar 

 and maple syrup come into our story. Everyone knows they are 

 processed from the sap of the maple tree but what makes that 

 sap so deliciously sweet? As it surges through the maple trees in 

 springtime, the sap dissolves the sugar they have stored up. Thus 

 sugar and sap flow out together into containers the canny Ver- 

 monters have mounted under holes they make in the trunks. 

 Boiling does the rest. 



Why Leaves Change Color and What Makes Them Fall 



As children first notice the reds and yellows about the time of 

 the first cold snap, they often conclude that frost causes the leaves 

 to change from green to bright fall coloring. As it happens, frost 

 is not the cause, though lower temperatures do have some bearing 

 on the change. With the coming of colder weather the earth starts 

 to harden and the trees are no longer able to draw much water 

 from it. 



