Reflection
Today’s passage from The Wild Trees surprised me. I have had the privilege of hiking in the Hoh rain forest on the Olympic peninsula. It was a profound experience to be so small in the presence of these mighty living beings. Life hangs from every branch and covers every step you take. I hope you all have the chance to visit such a place.
Tree roots
This photo was from my last visit to Hoh. For scale, that blue spot to the right is my son.
Biomass is the sheer weight of living material in an ecosystem. The biomass of a temperate rain forest on the Olympic Peninsula of Washington seems to be two or three times greater than that of the deep rain forest of the Amazon Basin. – Richard Preston
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Love the reflection.
I’ve been to the rainforest a couple of times – my sister has lived in Seattle for most of her adult life now, and I visit whenever I can. I love it, even if I’m from a state that gets a LOT more sun and a LOT less rain.
I’ll never forget my first experience with Seattle and the Olympic Peninsula (heck, the Pacific Northwest in general) – I nearly stepped on a banana slug as long as my teenaged foot on the UW campus and didn’t see Rainier at all, and I was hit hard by clear-cut swaths of Olympic forest.
It’s almost like a home away from home for me, and writing this makes me pine for the area again…
Lex – thanks – the picture is from our New Year’s camping trip. The puddles were huge!
Brian – I’m so pleased for you to have had time in the rain forest. It is a remarkable place. I saw clear cut for the first time in 1991. It made me sick at heart. I have gotten used to the managed forest land out here, but a fresh clear cut still hurts to see.
Have you been following the new predator for the Spotted Owl? Turns out our human efforts to save habitat have also opened habitat for the Barred Owl. The Barred Owl is bigger and stronger than the Spotted Owl. The twists and turns of conservation…
We lived here five year before I saw a banana slug!
Thank you for your coverage of the TVA sludge. What a story – you were way out ahead on it too. Well done.
The last time I was out to the rain forest was 2000, when my wife and I hiked in it on our NW honeymoon. We have some amazing pictures.
I haven’t been following the barred owl thing, however. I can’t say I’m surprised, though. The law of unintended consequences rearing its ugly head.
Whoa, that’s a puddle?
At least the spotted owl’s new predation problem is a more natural one…now all we need are some human predators.
And if there’s ever a place where you can imagine their being beasts who’ll come out of the forest primeval and gobble you up, it’s the PNW. I got the chance to live in B.C. for a little while and i did truly love it…except the 40 days and 40 nights of rain at a time thing.
Brian – we came out here too for our honeymoon. People thought we were nuts – but we knew better.
Lex – pretty good puddle isn’t it! I think my puddle scale might be skewed… BC is fabulous. I really want to explore Vancouver Island. Yes the gray and overcast gets a bit much come February, but summer is glorious and worth waiting for – as you know.