27 November 2010

Epic Redwoods ~ Preston & NatGeo Spotlight...

Thanks to Nick Aster on TriplePundit for spotting Richard Preston at TED speaking about The Wild Trees... This in turn reminded me of an amazing piece in my favorite magazine, National Geographic, by Joel Bourne on The Super Trees. Central to the piece are the stunning photographs by Michael Nichols and team, including the huge tree photo-montage...
"At least 1,500 years old, a 300-foot titan in California's Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park has the most complex crown scientists have mapped. This photo, taken by Michael Nichols, is a mosaic composed of 84 images [...made using three cameras, robo-dolly, gyro-stabilizer, plus plenty of patience...] This tree, at 301 feet, isn't even close to the world's tallest, at 379.1, but accord­ing to [Humboldt State University Professor of Botany, Stephen] Sillett, who is waiting for [Wildlife Conservation Soci­ety biologist and National Geographic Soci­ety explorer-in-residence Mike] Fay at an opening in the canopy right at the very top, it is "super juicy" -- loaded with canopy soils and biodiversity. From there the two men peer out upon a nearly unbroken expanse of huge redwoods, with one clear-cut barely visible to the south."

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