What is the significance of leaf decay in plant life? What gives the plant this phenomenon?

What is the significance of leaf decay in plant life? Great. The leaves have done their job of providing wood with nutrients throughout the spring and summer and can now go away.

What is the significance of leaf decay in plant life? Important. If the leaves remain on trees or bushes, they will serve as the cause of their death.

What is the significance of leaf decay in plant life? Philosophical. The leaves die and free up space for new shoots.

What is the significance of leaf decay in plant life? Aesthetic. Falling leaves are the most beautiful phenomenon in the world of trees.

Autumn

The leaves of most bushes and trees change color and fall off. They seem to compete in beauty. But in plants such as alder, young poplar, lilac, leaves do not change color until frost and remain green. And on the first snow turn black.

Some herbaceous representatives - pansy, wild radish, shepherd's purse, bluegrass annual - blossom until late autumn.

Periodic phenomena, such as flowering or leaf fall, in plants are caused by seasonal changes.

Winter

With the onset of autumn, all living things are getting ready for winter. The life of plants also freezes. They are in a state of rest in the winter - they do not grow, they do not feed, they do not live in full measure, but they do exist. And with the onset of spring and the beginning of sap flow, the plants receive new forces and are reborn. To survive a long period of rest is made possible by the supply of nutrients, which are "taken care," including the leaves. With the onset of cold weather, they become unnecessary plants. Moreover, they can cause their death.

The leaves evaporate the moisture in the summer and could do it in the winter (as the laundry is dried in the frost). Thus, they would dehydrate the tree, and it would be doomed. The leaf fall in the life of plants is vital. Protecting yourself from drying and dying, trees and bushes dump the dead parts before the onset of cold weather.

Autumn leaves

Before falling, they give nutrients to the plant. Cork is formed at the base of the leaf petiole, and it dies. Then it separates from the branch under its own weight or from a gust of wind. The importance of leaf fall in plant life can not be overestimated. Without it, a huge part of the flora would have died, only coniferous and tropical specimens would have remained.

Evergreen plants

They are characterized by constant coloration of the leaves. This does not mean that they live forever. In evergreen crops, leaf fall allows plants to be constantly updated. They lose dead parts throughout the entire growing season, like human hair. In evergreen plants, old leaves fall off. The younger ones are preserved in the same color.

Tropical evergreen plants are characterized by leaves, the duration of vegetation is several years or months. Although there are specimens for a short time remaining with bare trunks.

How many leaves live

The duration of their life is not the same and can range from 14 days to 20 years. The leaves of perennials in comparison with the root and stems live significantly less. This is because they are very active and do not have the ability to be updated.

In evergreen plants in the central Russia, such as spruce and pine, the needles fall off after 5-7 years in the first and 2-4 years in the second.

The duration of the leaf fall is also not the same. At the birch this period lasts about two months, and the linden is only two weeks.

Why leaves change color

The fact that the tree is preparing for winter, it becomes visible by changing the color of the leaves. They are magnificent in their wilting - yellow, red, brown, orange with various transitions and shades. It becomes sad, when all this beauty is flying around and covering the earth with a solid carpet.

Leaf fall is a biological process, which is incorporated in the vital activity and development of the plant. The intensity of all intracellular processes decreases (photosynthesis, respiration), the content of nutrients (ribonucleic acid, nitrogen and potassium compounds) decreases. Hydrolysis begins to predominate over the synthesis of substances, the cells accumulate decay products (calcium oxalate). More valuable plastic and mineral compounds from the leaves go into the storehouses of the plant.

Most of the bushes and trees become autumn red and yellow. Red shades are caused by the accumulation in the cells of the pigment anthocyanin, which reacts to the acid and changes color to a purple hue. In an alkaline environment, it would become bluish-blue.

The yellow color of the leaves depends on pigments (carotene, xanthophyll) and cell sap (flavones). So, very prosaic, the beauty of the autumn forest is explained.

Fertilizer

The role of leaf fall in plant life is very significant. It protects the roots from freezing. The lush forest litter, due to the friability and the presence of a large amount of air, reduces the thermal conductivity of the soil and prevents its deep freezing in the winter.

In addition, it is sufficiently humid, which is important for plants. Fallen leaves serve as a mulching material, protect the soil from erosion and prevent the formation of a crust. Rotted, they improve the structure of the soil and attract earthworms.

Fallen leaves are a valuable organic fertilizer with the content of phosphorus, potassium, calcium, nitrogenous substances and beneficial microelements. Thus, favorable conditions for plants are created. In the forests grow huge trees without the introduction of any fertilizers.

Fallen leaves in the garden

The modern gardener does not appreciate the peasant experience of the past. It annually burns as much fertilizer and structural material as it would be enough for both compost and mulching. Some growers do not save leaves by ignorance, others are afraid of the spread of infections. But if you approach this question sensibly, then all their fears are in vain.

The fact is that the causative agents of diseases die when the compost ripens and is processed by earthworms. Consequently, it is advisable to lay the leaves of fruit crops for getting humus, and leave a healthy pillow of birch, lime, chestnut, maple, etc. for mulching for the next summer period.

Shelter of this kind will be a salvation for valuable plants in snowless winters. For example, for strawberries, daffodils, new plantings.

In the spring fallen dry leaves you can mulch the planting of peppers, aubergines and tomatoes in greenhouses and greenhouses. These crops require dry air and moist soil. A thick layer of dry leaves will create the necessary microclimate, will become an obstacle to the growth of weeds, and all summer will please the autumn landscape in a separate greenhouse.

Early Crop

Valuable properties of leaf fall can be used to grow early crops of vegetables (cucumbers, potatoes, cabbage, zucchini, etc.) or for accelerated planting of strawberry bushes, flowers. Since autumn they have prepared shallow, shovel-like, trenches. Then fill them with healthy fallen leaves and spill a solution of slurry. On top lay juicy leaves of cabbage, tops of root crops, etc. In this form, leave trenches for the winter. The taken out earth is left side by side in the form of a crest.

Over the winter, the contents of the trench will settle, become saturated with melt water and condense. The earth in the crest under the bright sun is melting and warming up faster. As soon as the soil allows, the roller is raked into the trench and the early vegetables are planted. You can build a small film tunnel over young plants to protect them from frost.