Higher ground turns first, so the slopes above the road lead the valley by a few days.
Weather Hard frost Saturday night. Peak may come early and go fast.
1 report came in from Chaffee County this week, 1 of them still green. Our date held. See the county on the map.
Still greenStartingNearly peakPeakPast peakNo fall canopy we forecastInside the line, each band of elevation is painted on its own date.
Around Collegiate Peaks Wilderness Chaffee County holds most of the wilderness and is nearly peak today. That’s the county as a whole, which peaks 5 days later than the wilderness’s own stands: the wilderness is just past peak. Gunnison County, to the southwest, is 1 day behind. Pitkin County, to the northwest, is 1 day behind.By elevation The wilderness runs from about 9,872 to 12,910 feet. That’s 6 days of season between the top and the bottom: the high stands peak around Sep 23, the low ground holds until about Sep 26, and the color comes downhill in between. The date at the top of this page is the 11,000 to 12,000 foot band.
12,000–13,000 ftPeak colorpeak Sep 2330%
11,000–12,000 ftJust past peakpeak Sep 2240%
10,000–11,000 ftJust past peakpeak Sep 1920%
9,000–10,000 ftPeak colorpeak Sep 267%
SepOctNov
Height off 3DEP inside the wilderness’s own boundary; each band carries the date our model gives that elevation, corrections and all. The percentage is how much of the wilderness stands in it.
See it now PhenoCam Network, SNOD-MA camera, 19 km away, captured Sep 24.
That’s 4 days later than our model alone would say. This September has been running warm, which shifts peak color.
Set the days you can be here. Everything under them answers for those days, not for peak.
Monday 21 September to Tuesday 22 September
You’ll find it peak color up high, just past peak lower down.
Up at 12,000 feet the stands peak around Sep 23; down at 11,000 feet they hold on until about Sep 19. Pick your elevation for the day you come.
12,000–13,000 ftPeak colorpeak Sep 23
11,000–12,000 ftPeak colorpeak Sep 22
10,000–11,000 ftJust past peakpeak Sep 19
Where to drive
Independence Pass (CO 82), about 10 miles · Cottonwood Pass (CO 306), about 11 miles · Maroon Creek Road, about 25 miles
What turns
quaking aspen, narrowleaf cottonwood, willow, thinleaf alder, water birch
What turns, and when
quaking aspen72%
narrowleaf cottonwood11%
willow7%
thinleaf alder4%
water birch4%
Gambel oak3%
Also named across Colorado, outside what the canopy read measures here: Rocky Mountain Maple.
Colorado aspens are the main event, turning entire mountainsides gold and amber while Gambel oaks add russet and orange at lower elevations and cottonwoods line the rivers in yellow.
This forecast is built from the species that stand here, their elevation and this September’s weather, and corrected in season by cameras, foresters and our own crew. Out here we score it against NASA's satellite record of when the canopy shuts down, read inside each unit’s own boundary: two dates in three land within 12 days of it. How this map is made
