Wonderful as are the “giant” trees in WA’s southwest, their forests’ understorey is every bit as splendid, and is also unique.
Leave a CommentTag: forest
Eucalyptus Jacksonii is one of three Tingle species; the other two are less gigantic, but still very substantial.
All have very thick “skins”, as pictured.
They occur only within the “Walpole Wilderness”.
Like their “biggest brother”, a Rate’s tingle (Eucalyptus brevistylis) or a yellow tingle (Eucalyptus guilfoylei) can live for 400 years.
It appears increasingly likely that no 21st century “newborn” is even remotely likely to attain such a lifespan.
Leave a Comment
The photo shows part of the base of a Red Tingle, Eucalyptus Jacksonii; no other Eucalypt attains a greater girth.
The pictured example is not as “obese” as the nearby “Giant Tingle Tree”, but it is also several hundred years old, and massive.
Leave a Comment
You are looking at new growth on a very old, very large tree.
The Red Tingle – Eucalyptus Jacksonii – is a survivor, just, from a much wetter time.
Its “suitable habitat” has shrunk to a tiny portion of Western Australia’s south coast; almost all of it within Walpole-Nornalup National Park, which contains the wettest part of southern Western Australia.
Leave a Comment
Wikipedia description of the Porongurup Range’s geomorphology:
The Porongurup Range is 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) from east to west and consists of porphyritic granite[3] peaks levelled into domes. The range is the remnant of a sizeable reservoir of molten granite that bubbled up when the Antarctic continent struck Australia in the Stenian Period of the Mesoproterozoic Era, around 1200 million (1.2 billion) years ago.[9]
The sea levels of the late Cretaceous were around 100 metres higher than today[10]and during this time the Porongurup Range was an island surrounded by the sea.
Leave a Comment
This post’s images show the appearance of the forest understory on the lower slopes of the Porongurups at the driest time of year, in an especially dry summer.
The local climate is “Mediterranean”, with cool wet winters, and warm dry summers.
Each photo’s “hero” dead leaf is wedged, approximately as high above the forest floor as would be the eyes of a tall human, standing there.
In such a forest (one dominated by tall eucalypts) it is perfectly normal to see the ground rendered largely invisible – “buried” beneath masses of leaf litter, bark, twigs & small branches.
Leave a Comment
This post’s forest floor “natural abstract” was photographed a couple of minutes later than was the “5” Porongurup image.
Their locations were only a few footsteps distant from each other.
One of the world’s greater guitarists has (unwitttingly) provided a sublime musical accompaniment..
Leave a Comment
A forest floor’s “natural abstracts” often delight me rather more than do some allegedly “iconic” abstract artworks on “important” galleries’ walls.
As is true of all photos in the current series’ “Porongurup” sequence, the photo is ©️ Doug Spencer, & was taken in mid-afternoon of 12 February 2025, on the northern side of Porongurup National Park.
Leave a Comment
Any forest’s floor will repay your close attention, at any time.
This is true even when an unusually-prolonged dry spell has ensured that on this day the relevant forest will fail to deliver its usual visual treat in the “fungi department”.
However, in the “Karri trees’ annual exfoliation department” all was as it should be on 12 February 2025 in Porongurup National Park.
Leave a Comment
You are looking at the “skin” on a venerable Karri’s trunk, as it was on the afternoon of 12 February 2025.
Six months earlier – or six months later – it would have looked remarkably different, in both colour and texture.
Karri shed and renew their bark in an annual cycle.
“Karri loam” – the particular soil type in which Karri trees grow – is primarily composed of decomposed Karri bark!
Leave a Comment