2018 Rocky Mountain National Park Fall Color Update

Autumn has arrived in Rocky Mountain National Park. At this point it appears we are going to be a little ahead of schedule on the turning of the leaves. I photographed these aspens at peak along the Bierstadt Moraine last week. Many areas of Rocky Mountain National Park are at peak or quickly nearing peak. Technical Details: Nikon D850, Nikkor 16-35mm F4 AF-VR lens

Just wanted to give my readers a quick update on the current fall color situation in Rocky Mountain National Park as I’ve been questions daily on how things look. What I will say in a broad generalization is the following based on my observations being out in the field everyday the past week.

I believe we are running five to seven days ahead of what the normal timing is for fall color in RMNP. Whether this is because of a warm and dry summer, or because of all the smoke and haze over the park much of the late summer triggering the plants in to thinking there is less sunlight I’m not sure. At this point what seems obvious is that we are certainly running ahead of schedule and that the warm and very windy week we just had is not helping in extending fall color any.

First things first, the autumn color in Rocky Mountain National Park is nearing or just past peak in many areas now. Bear Lake was at peak on Friday, September 14th I would say. This is about 5 days earlier then when peak typically occurs at Bear Lake. While the leaves are at peak, the winds have done a number on many of the aspen trees around Bear Lake. You will stay be able to photograph fall color this week at Bear Lake but its going to be slightly past peak and depending on how strong the winds are, there may not be much left by the end of the week.

The Bierstadt Moraine is currently about 50-60% turned. Many of the trees are showing the stress from the drier summer and while there are nice patches of yellow and orange, there are also some areas that have just turned brown. This week, Bierstadt might be one’s best overall location for autumn color.

As for other areas of Rocky, I would say the mid level elevations will be at peak this week with the lower levels starting to show decent color in the ground cover as well as some of the trees. The Boulder Brook area of the park is only about half turned and should be good over the next week or more as this area does well even after the leaves have fallen as they cover the forest floor.

The elk rut is also well underway and if your timing is good you should be able to find some good groups of bull’s with their harems in Moraine, Horseshoe and the Kawunneche Valley. I do think the warm weather has caused the rutting activity to slow quickly after sunrise and I would also say I’m still observing a fair amount of elk activity in higher elevations of the park stll.

Now is really a great time to get out in Rocky and take advantage of the fall color and autumn elk rut. I think overall color this year is going to be on the fair to marginal side but there is plenty of opportunities to find subjects to photograph if you look. At the current pace, I would expect most fall color in Rocky Mountain National Park to be well past peak by the first week of October.