Bobbledy contributor extraordinaire (a moniker we would bestow even were he not the son of the son of Robbi’s dad’s cousin), Simon has sent us two more in his series of remarkable, fantastical drawings. In keeping with February’s theme, Simon’s latest works explore the wonderful world of trees, with an emphasis on the tallest among them.
Because I am a writer and not a tree specialist, I was not previously aware of the mighty Hypselofolius, and even the most well-intentioned Google search did not bring me closer to discovery.
One can only assume that Simon has been traipsing about in previously unexplored sections of the upper atmosphere, in places where even the most intrepid fear to go. His discovery is a worthy one indeed, an amazing flower more than twice the height of a 98-foot Oak tree.
I cannot say whether or not the Hypselofolius is in any way related to the Hypselodoris, a genus of colorful sea slugs, but I would bet at least five dollars that it is not.
I have never been a fan of slugs, but I must say that the little fellow above has sweetened my opinion of the species (if slugs are even a species; again, I repeat, I was an English major).
Moving on, then, to Simon’s second drawing, which was, we suspect, inspired by Benji McBean’s Amazing Machines, here is Simon’s Poppler-Planting, Beech-Beginning, Redwood Rebuting, Robot (Simon’s dad Brad sent along a note that suggests that “rebut” is but a more enlightened way of spelling “reboot,” a fact which, as an English major, I am very glad to know.)
Being a lover of trees, I have utmost respect for a machine that exists to make more of them. It is a refreshing thought in this age in which trees and machines seem so often to be at odds. A benevolent robot indeed. A marvelous machine. Thank you, Simon, for your vision, your ingenuity, and your efforts to advance the English language (“rebut” being one letter more efficient than “reboot”).
Matthew has written a story about a tree. If you have ever read “The Giving Tree” (which is, reading it as an adult and parent, perhaps the most depressing book that was ever written), don’t worry, this one seems like it’s headed in that direction but ends up in a different place.
Enjoy.
Tree Story
by Matthew
There once was a tree at the edge of a pond full of cheerful fish. It did not have a name because it was a tree. It was an old tree. People had been ignoring the tree for decades, and that was how the tree liked it.
One day, a man named Ben came along with a saw and hacked off one of the tree’s branches to make a fishing pole. The tree was outraged and would have shouted angrily if only trees had mouths. The tree would have chased after the person in a rage if only trees had legs. The tree would have campaigned on behalf of a mayoral candidate who disapproved of cutting tree branches if only trees had the right to vote.
But as it was, the tree just had to stand there and suffer.
Fortunately, being a tree, the loss of one branch was not such a big deal.
However, the next day, Ben’s friend Randy came by and hacked off a branch, too. This made the tree so mad it wanted to say a naughty word. But it had to settle for thinking a naughty word, in which it took some small degree of comfort.
Ben and Randy were part of a bowling league, and they told all of their friends in the league about what great fishing poles they had made out of branches from the tree. Day after day, they came and took branches, which made the tree so sad he hardly knew what to do.
But, being a tree, he did nothing. It’s hard to be a tree.
Eventually, the tree had no more branches down low where Ben and his rowdy friends could reach them. So Ben and his rowdy friends stopped coming to the pond.
Eventually…and this is the great part about being a tree, new branches sprouted where the old ones had been. Eventually stronger, better branches grew in their place.
By this time, Randy and his friends were all in wheelchairs with bad knees.
But the tree was as happy as he’d ever been. Trees usually get the last laugh.
One of the interesting things about this story is that Matthew (without having done any research at all) has written about one of the tree facts that I found most interesting: trees (apparently) don’t die of old age. They are only killed – generally by insects, disease, or people. So if you grew a tree in a spot where none of those things could get to it, it could, possibly, live forever! But since no one has done that and we also wouldn’t be able to PROVE “forever” I guess we’ll never know.
ps: How many matchsticks does the average tree produce? A quick google search says “one million.” That’s a silly number. I’m pretty sure it is totally unsubstantiated. What are the odds that the average would equal such a nice round number? The moral of the story is: don’t trust google.
Don’t forget to share your interesting tree stories, drawings or facts with us, here, in an email, or on our Facebook page!
As we have discovered, trees are awesome. But what’s awesomer than trees? Goats in trees.
Yes. One of the interesting trees I learned about while I was reading all about trees was the argan tree. Argan trees are found in Morocco. Morocco is a country in Africa, which is basically on the other side of the Earth from the US.
Argan fruit grows on argan trees, and it turns out goats are really fond of argan fruit. So much so that when the fruit is ripe, goats take to the trees to eat right off the branches, instead of patiently waiting for the fruit to fall to the ground.
They make very dedicated goats in Morocco.
But here’s a bonus fact: argan oil comes from the nut inside the fruit that the goats like to eat. It’s a very hard nut. At some point in the past, someone discovered that once the nut has been digested, it’s much easier to crack. This is a delicate way of saying that people used to collect the nuts out of the goat poop instead of straight from the tree because then it was much more crackable.
They make very dedicated argan oil harvesters in Morocco.
Nowadays, argan nuts are (supposedly) collected in a more hygienic way, though I must confess I couldn’t find any specifics about how they solved the hard nut problem, so who knows? And if you’re wondering what people use argan oil for – it’s recently been celebrated as a supernut of sorts, and is used as a “heart-healthy” oil for food and as an ingredient in very expensive skin and beauty products. All of this is to say that suddenly argan oil has become very popular.
So get to work, goats!
Have you learned about any interesting trees? Let us know by sharing in the comments below or on our Facebook Page HERE.
Some of the oldest and biggest trees in the world are found in California – redwoods, sequoias, and bristlecone pines. The oldest living tree (a bristlecone pine) is around 5,056 years old – scientists keep its exact location secret so nobody goes and tries to make gazillions of toothpicks out of it. The tallest tree is a sequoia called “Hyperion” that is 379 feet tall. That number might not be so easy to understand, but if you think that Alden is about 3 1/2 feet tall, you’d have to stack up about 108 Aldens to be that tall. And we only have one.
Recently, National Geographic magazine photographed another very tall sequoia called “The President,” which comes in at a measly 247 feet (only 70.5 Alden’s stacked up, though we still only have one):
It still took 32 days to get a photograph, which was actually 126 separate photos that they stuck together to make one giant photo. Check out this great video showing how they did it:
Have anything tree-related you’d like to share? Enter it in the comments below, on the Facebook page, or just email us and we’ll put it up.
Hello everyone! It is the start of FEBRUARY, so it’s time to reveal this months Theme of the Month –
Trees!
Now, trees are all over the place. They’re everywhere. You might think they’re not that special. That this is kind of a boring topic for a theme of the month. I hate to say it, but if you’re thinking that, YOU ARE WRONG.
Because trees are AMAZING! They are BEAUTIFUL! They are FUN TO CLIMB! But the most important reason trees are special to us (and it’s a totally selfish reason) is that trees help keep us well-stocked in oxygen. It’s complicated, but the basic idea is that the air that trees breathe out (oxygen) is the air that we breathe in. And the air that trees breathe in (carbon dioxide) is the air that we breathe out. I say this is complicated because trees don’t actually breathe. They do “photosynthesis”. The point is, we humans have air to breathe all thanks to trees.
You might have noticed in my diagram that trees also give off a little bit of carbon dioxide and water. They do that through “cellular respiration,” which we care less about because it doesn’t give us all that oxygen we want so badly. I’m not going to say it here (because of potty mouth) but it’s kind of like farting and peeing for trees.
So basically, trees are NECESSARY FOR US TO SURVIVE. If all of a sudden we ran out of trees, we wouldn’t have enough oxygen to breathe. It would be WAY WORSE than running out of ice cream.
Over the course of the month, we’ll be sharing interesting facts and stories and pictures and everything about trees. Send us an email if you have anything interesting to share, or post it here or on our Facebook page.
In the meantime, enjoy one of our very favorite songs around here, “Photosynthesis” by the very best They Might Be Giants (while you’re at it, go buy the CD/DVD set – the songs are great, the animation on the videos are great, it’s one of our favorite dance party videos, period).
And remember, start thinking about and wondering about and writing about and drawing about trees this month. Everyone who sends us something or comments gets entered to win a free book or CD at the end of the month!
