SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) – A wet spring and three years of summer drought has created “the perfect storm” for dull fall colors and premature dead trees this season.
John Ball, a professor and forestry specialist with SDSU Extension, said this will be a bad year to see the fall colors in South Dakota. The wet spring invites diseases and the dry summers and falls are causing the leaves to die and drop early.
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“Here we had a lot of infected leaves that were beginning to decline and then the water shut off,” Ball said. “The leaves are dropping because of the drought. So it’s really two punches. First of all, the leaves were not going to have a good fall color because of all the diseases. And then added to that, the drought is causing the leaves to drop.”
The summer drought from the last two to three years, depending on the part of the state, has stressed the trees out to the point where the tops of birch, maple and honey locust trees are completely dead.