I mentioned a couple of
days ago that Colin and I had visited a tiny patch of rainforest
called Victoria Park. Today I would like to show you a few of the
photographs I took there. The young man in the Ballina Information
Office was quite passionate about this little park telling us how it
was the only area left of the pristine rainforest when the timber men
finished their destruction of the local cedar and pine trees that
were used to make packing cases for the banana crops.
Rainforests are known
for their huge buttress rooted trees and this one abounded with them.
For those of you who
have not been into a rainforest, they are often quite dark, not
overly crowded with leaves in the lower levels but the roof of the
forest is a mat of leaves that shut out the sunlight to the ground
below.
Knowing this I dug out
the flash gun and extension lead and attached it to my camera before
stepping out of the sunlight. It is a bit tricky using an unattached
flash gun but I gripped it with the last two fingers of my right
hand, guiding its direction with my left hand before that hand was
used to support the camera. When you want something badly enough you
work for it!!
There were patches of
brightness along the way where large trees had been blown down by
strong winds, these trees had crashed down tearing off branches of
other trees on their way and leaving huge windows of light – and
dead leaves.
Although the 300 year
old strangler fig has long gone there is another that is growing up
and will one day rival the first for size. The fruit from a strangler
fig will be deposited in the angle of a branch of an established
tree, either falling there or being dropped there by a bird or animal
and starts to grow in the moist leaf litter that is caught there.
There were some great
signs in the rainforest that were worthy of a photograph.
Without a person
standing nearby it is not easy to see how large this tree is. You
will have to take my word for it!
My last picture for
today is also of a sign.
I thought the signs
rather clever, I can't pronounce the names, I wonder if you can?
(Clicking on the picture enlarges them)
AJ
