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Plants are green because they have chlorophyll...

Originally posted by: Mrvile
They've got chlorophyll too, they just have more red pigments than green.
Click to expand...

Correct.

And all trees have different combinations of pigments, but often you only see the green because there is more of it. During Fall, the leaves begin transfering what food they have left back into the roots, and you're left with just the more colorful pigments.

Now the real question is, what advantage does a dark red leaf have over green leaves?
 
It looks like an ornimental plum, so chances are it has been selectively bred to be that way, but there are lots of plants that have strong red pigmentation in the wild. Usually they live very thick forest conditions where the red coloring helps them absorb light from other spectra that penetrate the thick canopy. By the time sunlight has passed through several layers of leaves on its way to the forest floor, there's not much left that would be absorbed by green pigments, because it already has been.
 
Different chlorophyll use different parts of the light spectrum. In the case of green chlorophyll, they use everything but the green.
 
I have one of those next to my driveway. When it blossoms in the spring the fragrance is awesome. Sadly I am going to have to cut it down if I can't move it as I need to get my driveway widened a bit.
 
Green Chlorophyll is the predominant form seen in most plants. Some plants have more red or yellow chlorophyll - hence the color variations in leaves. Regardless of the color, all leaves have all (or most) types of chlorophyll in some proportion. In the fall, trees turn red, yellow and orange, because the green chlorophyll breaks down leaving the red and yellow kinds behind to color the leaves.
 
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