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The Perfect Gift

Last year I got the perfect Christmas gift, a beautiful book called "Ancient Forests." Ever since I first set eyes on the old growth forests in Alaska, Oregon and Canada, I've been awed by the immense size of many of the trees both in height and girth, the lush under-story of the coastal temperate rain forests and the beautiful mosses hanging from and covering branches, tree trunks, fallen giants and stumps from early logging days.

Fascinating too, were the numerous nurse logs and stumps from which new life had sprung-fungi, gorgeous ferns, and trees. And, yes, even wild flowers. I believe if most people set eyes on such peaceful beauty they would never want to see another tree cut down let alone in old growth forests.

When my husband, Jim, and I went on a cruise of Puget Sound several of our shoreside stops afforded us opportunities to walk in old growth forests. Later,  in our cruise ship's library, I fell in love with the book mentioned above. The color photography was superb and captured to a "T" much of what we had seen. When on shore in Vancouver we visited several bookstores trying to buy it but were told it was out of print. However, the largest store has been trying for over two years to locate it for us with no luck. Finally, Jim asked PASSTIMES Bookstore in Sister Bay to try to get it for my Christmas present.

Would you believe it? They found it in a second-hand book store that deals in hard-to-find and out-of-print books.  It was in perfect condition. The photographs are excellent and the text tries to explain fairly the importance of preserving what's left of the old growth forests and the inter-relationships between the great trees, their understory and wild life. It also tells us how many of these things can't exist without each other.

There are creatures in these forests that spend their lives in the upper story of the trees.  Some of the creatures are specialists in this forest community only eating something found here or only nesting here. Timber interests have considered the preservationists as "whacko" because the spotted owl, cousin to our barred owl, has become a "Holy Grail" in the fight to save what's left in these forests.

The warbled murrelet, a seabird that only nests in the protection of these forests, could possibly have become this "grail" instead of the owl.

Salmon return from the sea to spawn in the forest's grave-bottomed streams. Coastal bears need the forest's shelter; some hibernate in old hollow trees. 

One resident of this type of forest, a tree-top dweller, is the Oregon red tree vole, a favorite food of the spotted owl. This mouse-like canopy- dweller's cousin, the red-backed vole, is an under-story dweller and also is on the spotted owl's menu.  This vole eats seeds and grasses and green plants but its favorite food is truffles, the furling bodies of underground fungi that the vole may enjoy in his subterranean burrow. There is a symbiotic relationship between the hair like tree roots and the truffles.

These fungi obtain sugars from the trees while the trees are enabled to take up more minerals and gain protection from pathogens. As the vole scampers through his underground chambers he scatters spores of just-eaten truffles assuring the next generation of fungi.

The decaying logs on the forest floor provide the voles with cover, food and water. This brief description of interrelationships and dependence barely touches on why the old growth forests are so necessary.  The spotted owl, according to recent studies, needs 2,000 to 3,000 acres of ancient forest to survive. It contains the bird's food supply and affords greater shelter from the "tiger of the air" (the horned owl), a predator, and displacement by barred owls.

I believe the conservation groups trying to save the old growth forests are right. The destruction of these forests would be a tragedy in loss of beauty, wildlife, and watershed. That would no doubt affect the coastal climate because the balance of moisture and oxygen-carbon dioxide exchange would be affected. Further, once gone they can never be replaced and with their demise would be the demise of many species that are dependent upon them for existence.

Yes, last year I got the perfect gift for Christmas, worth more than silver or gold, for I have the beauty of the old growth forests preserved in the pictures in my book. 

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