In nature the color red often warns of poison—yet in the fall, red more often means a showy last hurrah before the gloomy grays of winter drop over us.

             It’s there in a Winged Euonymus’s fiery torch.                                                                                         

                                 It creeps into the glossy glow of a cotoneaster.                                                 It’s there in the magma-hot spread of a geranium leaf over bleak mulch.And in the shocking red punch of a clutch of Jack-in-the-Pulpit seeds.

                     Bright Chokecherry leaves have a sheen that’s over-the-top satiny.                                  There is nothing subtle or soft here. These plants shout. And you can’t look away because you know . . . you’ve had your last warning.