white oak and northern red oak
red maple and shagbark hickory, peak Oct 22
Peak color should arrive around 22 Oct for the red maple and shagbark hickory, and around 31 Oct for the white oak and northern red oak.
Roadsides and wetland edges turn first, and the woods behind them run a few days later.
2 reports came in from Fairfax County this week, 1 of them patchy color and 1 of them just starting. Our date held. See the county on the map.
That’s 3 days later than our model alone would say. This September has been running warm, which shifts peak color.
Plan this tripIf you can only come on certain days
Set the days you can be here. Everything under them answers for those days, not for peak.
Monday 26 October to Tuesday 27 October
You’ll find it peak color.
That's the day our forecast puts peak color here.
- Where to drive
- Skyline Drive, about 67 miles · Route 39 (Goshen Pass), about 138 miles
- What turns
- white oak, northern red oak, red maple, shagbark hickory, American sycamore
What turns, and when
- white oak29%
- northern red oak28%
- red maple18%
- shagbark hickory14%
- American sycamore4%
- river birch2%
Also named across Virginia, outside what the canopy read measures here: Tulip Poplar, Sourwood.
Shenandoah's overlooks reveal a warm mosaic of gold tulip poplars, scarlet maples, bronze hickories, and the deep wine of white oaks stretching along the Blue Ridge.
Across Virginia as a whole: Early-to-mid October at the highest elevations, late October on Skyline Drive, early November in the Piedmont.
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