When is peak fall color at Mark Twain National Forest?

Our forecast puts peak color at Mark Twain National Forest around 1 Nov. The four days to aim for are 31 Oct to 3 Nov. We publish our error rate.

Mark Twain National Forest Fall Foliage: 2026 Peak Color Forecast

Q: What trees turn color at Mark Twain National Forest?

Sugar Maple, Red Oak, White Oak, Hickory, Sassafras. The Ozarks produce a warm fall palette dominated by gold and bronze from oaks and hickories, with sugar maples adding scarlet along the creek bottoms and sassafras glowing orange on the hillsides.

Peak color, most of the stand1 NovAim for 31 Oct to 3 Nov

In the forest today, Sep 25Still green

white oak and black oak

shagbark hickory and sugar maple, peak Oct 26

Peak color should arrive around 26 Oct for the shagbark hickory and sugar maple, and around 4 Nov for the white oak and black oak.

Roadsides and wetland edges turn first, and the woods behind them run a few days later.

No new reports from the ground here this week.

Still greenStartingNearly peakPeakPast peakNo fall canopy we forecastInside the line, each band of elevation is painted on its own date.

Around Mark Twain National Forest Wayne County holds most of the forest and is still green today.

By elevation The forest runs from about 407 to 1,285 feet. That’s 3 days of season between the top and the bottom: the high stands peak around Oct 31, the low ground holds until about Nov 3, and the color comes downhill in between. The date at the top of this page is the 1,000 to 1,250 foot band.

1,250–1,500 ftStill greenpeak Oct 317%
1,000–1,250 ftStill greenpeak Nov 131%
750–1,000 ftStill greenpeak Nov 231%
500–750 ftStill greenpeak Nov 218%
250–500 ftStill greenpeak Nov 313%

Height off 3DEP inside the forest’s own boundary; each band carries the date our model gives that elevation, corrections and all. The percentage is how much of the forest stands in it.

That’s 6 days later than our model alone would say. This September has been running warm, which shifts peak color.

Plan this trip

If you can only come on certain days

Set the days you can be here. Everything under them answers for those days, not for peak.

ArrivingLeaving

Saturday 31 October to Sunday 1 November

You’ll find it peak color up high, nearly peak lower down.

Up at 1,000 feet the stands peak around Nov 1; down at 500 feet they hold on until about Nov 3. Pick your elevation for the day you come.

1,000–1,250 ftPeak colorpeak Nov 1
750–1,000 ftPeak colorpeak Nov 2
500–750 ftPeak colorpeak Nov 2
250–500 ftNearly peakpeak Nov 3

Where to drive: Route 19 through Ozark National Scenic Riverways, about 9 miles · Route 7 Scenic Byway, about 129 miles
What turns: white oak, black oak, shagbark hickory, sugar maple

What turns, and when

white oak43%
black oak29%
shagbark hickory14%
sugar maple14%

Also named across Missouri, outside what the canopy read measures here: Red Oak, Sassafras.

The Ozarks produce a warm fall palette dominated by gold and bronze from oaks and hickories, with sugar maples adding scarlet along the creek bottoms and sassafras glowing orange on the hillsides.

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. We score it here against 7 long-running forest cameras: two dates in three land within 13 days of the camera’s own peak. How this map is made

All of Missouri