Broadleaved trees have big, thin-skinned leaves which allow them to absorb maximum sunlight. These leaves are delicate and vulnerable to winter winds, frost and snow. Broadleaved trees that grow in colder areas thus shed their leaves in winter -- they are deciduous. In autumn, the leaves turn beautiful shades of red, orange and yellow before they drop off the trees. Common deciduous trees are the oak, elm and beech.

     In much of the northern hemisphere, most of the natural broadleaved forests have been cut down to provide farmlands. Forests survive only in small patches, or on mountains. The only large areas of forest left are the coniferous forests of northern Scandinavia, Siberia, the north western United States, Canada and Alaska.