Every year someone asks me what is wrong with their pine trees. “They were looking so healthy and now the needles are turning yellow.” is the usual description. Well, even though pine trees are considered “evergreens” because they hold their needles through the winter, they also annually shed their older leaves in autumn like their deciduous cousins. Most eastern white pines, like those pictured here, shed their needles on a three year cycle, so the needles changing color and falling were the new leaves in the spring of 2006. The tell-tale sign those yellow needles are only doing what nature intended is to look closely at the branches and the outer needles are green while the inner needles are the ones turning color.
