As a consequence increases biomass rapidly. Growth is therefore always linked to an irreversible increase in weight. The cells multiply and increase in volume. All regulated growth-activities and metabolic processes go through an exponential stage of activity increase. It is followed by a phase of saturation where hardly any increase occurs until growth as a function of time reaches asymptotically a stop.
Several parameters indicate the drop in activity.
The most striking is maybe the reduction of the leaf size. In each shoot are the lowest leaves that have developed first larger than that at the tip. We discuss the transition to the reproductive stage in more detail in the context of flowering hormones. You will find more about this in the next section. Senescence starts together with flower development.