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Naturally Green

© N. Lou Lyons

Spring is well underway. All those April showers bring more than just May flowers. The great outdoors have burst alive with the color green. So many hues of green, in fact, that you can't help but notice more shades of green than are available in the 120 count box of Crayola Crayons.

Open a large box of Crayola's and you'll have choices like Pine Green, Forest Green, Spring Green and many others. Let's take a short walk down some back country road to uncover a few of the other greens found in the wild. Some you'll already be familiar with, others will be new to discover.

We look at different hues as being either warm or cool. Green is usually considered a cool color but we find that some greens are warm. An entire psychology of color has developed over the years. Studies continue to focus on how color affects our moods and emotions. Just like a traffic light, the color green can suggest a process to proceed. Green is also considered the color of growth.

Plant life offers us the most diverse palette of greens. Most of us can identify with forest green found in the darker species of pines. We even consider a green so common and plain that we may call it grass or true green. Within the plain greens are dozens of shades yet to be named. Here is a clump of wild daffodils in the middle of nowhere. The leaves look almost blue green. Definitely a cool color.

Looking up close at the new growth on plants and trees usually shows several hues quite different than the older growth. The young shoots and leaves look bright, shiny and almost yellow; the older darker green.

Afternoon sun shining directly on the new leaves of poplar and birch leaves blowing in the wind displays a shimmering shade of yellow green, or is it green yellow?

Other plants and trees along this road have new growth that is more warm than the yellow green. The leaves of sumac and new growth of wild raspberries have a maroon tinge on them. Maple leaves also appear maroon at the early stage. Hard to place a name on a color that looks maroon and green both.

Here we come to a little pond along the road. Underneath the water's surface are dozens of olive colored newts floating with their legs extended out. They are Eastern Red-Spotted Newts and are probably laying eggs. It's about that time.

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