TAKING THE AWE OUT OF AUTUMN: Global warming may ravage the sugar maples that set New England woods ablaze with color each fall and that provide the basic ingredient for America's maple syrup industry

摘要

When days shorten and nights grow cooler in late summer and fall, trees such as maple, oak and heech cloak themselves in the bright shades of autumn. No colors are more central to this palette than the yellows, oranges and reds of sugar maples, whichrange from eastern Canada through the mid-Atlantic states, west to Minnesota and south along the Appalachians into Tennessee. Also prized for timber and maple syrup, sugar maples highlight the foliage displays that draw millions of people outdoors for nature's autumn fling.