Why should I look for Recent fruit drop or Recent seed cone drop (conifers), and how can I tell if mature fruits or seed cones have dropped from my plant since my last visit?
Sometimes a fruit or seed cone is not ripe very long before it drops from the plant. This phenophase allows you to report that one or more fruits or seed cones ripened and dropped from the plant since your last visit. Evidence of ‘Recent fruit drop’ or ‘Recent seed cone drop’ may include mature fruits or seed cones on the ground below the plant that were not there on your last visit, or fruits or seed cones missing from the plant which were present on your last visit. For this phenophase, do not include the dropping of fruits or seed cones that are clearly immature and unripe, as often happens in a heavy rain or wind storm. You should also not include fruit pods, capsules, husks, or empty seed cones that long ago dropped all of their seeds and are only now falling from the plant.
