Leaves turning fiery like metal blades in a forge

Wenlock Edge, Shropshire Autumn's falling leaves are full of meaning: leaving and loss, mortality and decay

Sweet chestnut leaves reddened against the sky before the weather came: a moment of fire and glass before they flew. The long, saw-edged, leaves of the sweet or Spanish chestnut, naturalised in Britain since the iron age, had all the autumn colours in them.

Some were still green, but the cells where the leaf stalk attached to the branch were forming a dam, blocking the flow of sap and nutrients between leaf and tree. Each leaf was now on its own although still attached.