TREES RULE THE WORLD

JusT as children on playground roundabouts can make them go faster or slower by drawing in or extending their legs to shift the centre of weight, so deciduous trees can affect the speed at which the Earth turns. Every autumn, their discarded leaves end up about 90ft closer to the centre of the earth ( that’s the average difference between the treetops and the ground) and their combined weight makes us all spin a little faster.

In spring, the weight of new leaves growing high in the branches (and thus further away from the centre of the earth) slightly slows the world down again.

Other processes, such as tidal currents, also affect the Earth’s centre of gravity, so the trees only make a difference of fractions of a second, but it’s still quite a feat.