August 25, 2012 - Redwood

[footfootfoot]

Paper comes from crop trees, not virgin timber. Just like carrots, planted and harvested.

DON'T BELIEVE THE HYPE!
You've got to fight the power!
Fight the power!
Fight the powerful Trees!

Redwoods they are a hero to most,
But they never meant shit to me.
The suckers are racist, straight up and plain,
Motherfuck them and end grain.

[Adak]

Very huge and majestic. What most folk don't realize is that a mature Redwood forest like this, will support very few plants and animals. Once the Redwood tree's start blocking out the sunlight, and contaminating the forest floor with it's dead needle litter (which prevents nearly all species from germinating). The forest animals have to move on. Their food can't grow there, anymore.

It's more appropriate to say it's "quiet as a graveyard", instead of "quiet as a cathedral", in a mature Redwood forest.

[xoxoxoBruce]

And their root system is very shallow, no culture at all.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by Brianna

snip-- With NO SAFETY?--snip

run!

[ZenGum]

Originally Posted by Adak

Very huge and majestic. What most folk don't realize is that a mature Redwood forest like this, will support very few plants and animals. Once the Redwood tree's start blocking out the sunlight, and contaminating the forest floor with it's dead needle litter (which prevents nearly all species from germinating). The forest animals have to move on. Their food can't grow there, anymore.

It's more appropriate to say it's "quiet as a graveyard", instead of "quiet as a cathedral", in a mature Redwood forest.

There's plenty of life going on up in the canopy.

[footfootfoot]

Originally Posted by Brianna

And dungeon S & M play? With NO SAFETY?

Coz then you'd be my dream man!

How'd I miss this?

Beat me, bite me, hurt me. Make me write bad checks.

[Adak]

Originally Posted by ZenGum

There's plenty of life going on up in the canopy.

I lived near, ran in, and camped in redwood forests for 20 years. Mature redwood forest are a near desert of life, compared to area's where sunlight (even dappled), is allowed to reach the forest floor, and the redwood "duff" (needles it sheds), can't poison the earth.

The "Wonderful world of the mature redwood forest" crap you hear from the ecologists, is just that -- crap.

Ranks right up there with "let's spend our way out of debt".

[SPUCK]

The only tree on my property besides an orange tree is a 180ft redwood. It's about 10 foot in diameter. Talk about crapping all over the place! It dumps about two truckloads of debris year.

Then there's the pollen.. It's a shit storm of pollen for about a month. It cakes on things and if you think you don't have hay-fever just live under one of these babies for that month.

Oh oh then there are the seed months. They're in the winter. The tree casts them babies everywhere in about a 120 foot radius. The small little brown seeds leave insane dark purple puddles around them as soon as the dew or mist shows up. It's like it was designed to obliterate car paint.

Then there's the cast off limbs. You know the ones that are about 3 inches in diameter and you find them stuck in your lawn about a foot and a half deep like some javelin hurled from the sky.

All this layered over the fear that tree evokes in a big storm. Lone. 18 feet from the house....

It is beautiful though. Several raccoons and a family of squirrels live in the multi-ton balls of caught-and-piled-up debris balls scattered about in its limbs. Often hawks sit on the top terrorizing the chickens.

[ZenGum]

Now, I do like trees, and I like houses too, but this...

18 feet from the house....

... yeah, that's gonna be a problem.


Adak, note as SPUCK says, the critturs living in the canopy. I'll bet there's all sorts of bugs, and birds that eat the bugs, and parasitic plants and stuff up there.

[Gravdigr]

Originally Posted by Adak

Very huge and majestic. What most folk don't realize is that a mature Redwood forest like this, will support very few plants and animals. Once the Redwood tree's start blocking out the sunlight, and contaminating the forest floor with it's dead needle litter (which prevents nearly all species from germinating). The forest animals have to move on. Their food can't grow there, anymore.

Reminded me of this:

"The Trees"

by Rush


There is unrest in the forest
There is trouble with the trees
For the maples want more sunlight
And the oaks ignore their pleas

The trouble with the maples
(And they're quite convinced they're right)
They say the oaks are just too lofty
And they grab up all the light
But the oaks can't help their feelings
If they like the way they're made
And they wonder why the maples
Can't be happy in their shade

There is trouble in the forest
And the creatures all have fled
As the maples scream 'Oppression!'
And the oaks just shake their heads

So the maples formed a union
And demanded equal rights
'The oaks are just too greedy
We will make them give us light'
Now there's no more oak oppression
For they passed a noble law
And the trees are all kept equal
By hatchet, axe and saw

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by ZenGum

There's plenty of life going on up in the canopy.

Sequoia canopy.

[xoxoxoBruce]

One important animal that lives in the redwood forest canopy is the Clouded Salamander... snip

Neither that article, nor any others I can find, tell why this thing is important. Hyperbole I guess.

[footfootfoot]

You neglect the Pacific Tree Octopus

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by ZenGum

There's plenty of life going on up in the canopy.

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

Neither that article, nor any others I can find, tell why this thing is important. Hyperbole I guess.

It tips the balance of "life going on up in the canopy" from "some" to "plenty".

[xoxoxoBruce]

That still doesn't say why the Clouded Salamander is "important".