The veins on a leaf also represent a branching pattern that efficiently supplies the leaf with nutrients. An explosion pattern would provide a short route to each part of the leaf, but at the cost of a high total length of all the veins. The shortest total length of vein would be a single vein that traverses around the leaf near the perimeter. However, this would mean too long a supply route to some parts of the leaf. This pattern on a Slippery Elm leaf shows one compromise between the two extremes.