Astounding tree damage in Yowie Country!

[cryptobotanica]

... that's actually wind damage after a couple of wet weeks

trunk is approx 25cm diameter.

[SAB 8]

Great work with the photographic documentation. Always good to have a visual reference for conventional phenomena!

[cryptobotanica]

Thanks SAB. btw, is that just your nick or are you a former member of SAB Au? They're an interesting mob

This spot is quite sheltered most of the year... no damage to surrounding trees at all. Just this one looks like 400kg animal has grabbed the upper section and pulled it down until the base split (bend a tomato stake until it splinters sometime. Damage to the away-side, peeling up from the thick section).

Given my location and the location of the tree, I *could* plead yowie but it was fine one week, then we had a week of nasty westerlies and now it's screwed. Lack of displacement or damage to surround terrain, no prints, apart from cows, no damage to well advanced lichen or "old mans beard" on upper sections means it's wind. Unless a yowie can break a tree without touching it, which is probably taking "legends designed to stop kids wandering off on their own" a little too far

I believe, strictly because I have seen one too many things that do NOT fit this profile of damage.

Note that this location is used to wind stress - in areas where it is somewhat unusual (flood flats, etc) you will tend to find no splitting, just a neat shearing as the wind stress meets the point where the old wood at the base meets the new fast grorth above it... and snaps at the 60cm mark, usually just above the advanced-bark level.

Just down the hill from this tree is some VERY "off" country but that's more to do with people, than wild things.

[SAB 8]

Thanks SAB. btw, is that just your nick or are you a former member of SAB Au? They're an interesting mob

No - just the initials of my name! You have aroused my interest in SAB Au though... any links or details???

In regards to tree damage.... there is a lot of natural explanations. In particular, of late I have recently spent some time camping in an area surrounded by pine plantations. Over the last month or so, I have been heading in there and each time I`ve noticed a lot of new tree breaks and actual trees coming down. I must admit it doesn`t look like a healthy plantation. I remember doing a few months nursery work with Greening Australia and how they mentioned that even the dibbling process at the nursery was crucial in the plants growth. Eg. making sure the root system went in relative straight to avoid J-rooting which would cause kinks and weak points in the tree. In this particular plantation it looks like it was poorly planted and as a result the trees are breaking and sustaining damage from relatively minor winds and rainy periods..... I will keep this in the back of my mind next time I follow up anything occurring in state forests or plantations!

[cryptobotanica]

Many native species require a basically uninterrupted growth period, as juveniles. Basically, the less stress the better. Legend has it our "bush" is "tough" but it's not.... it's heat - hardy, once established, but it's actually some of the most pernickety stuff in the world as far as plants go.

hence why "native tubes" are twice the size of any other prop tube... uninterrupted root growth. Tap roots up to a k long dropfrom underneath many of our native trees and any stalling or stress will set them back decades.

I reveg using scarified , smoke and heat treated seed, not tubes. I am not operating within the "guidance" of any particular entity, just doing it for my great grandkids really.

GA do some excellent work though... often hampered by local interest groups (which is to say... the criminally disinterested) such as councils and whatnot.

I do have a largeish bank of permaculture or sustainable-production seeds available to any member of AYR that has a need for some.

Splitting and breaking has lot to do with many natives acting like Bolivian cacti - they store water as available and rely on protected locations but all it takes is some wet times, and a little clearing up the road, and they snap like matchsticks.

To inflict the kind of advanced tree damage blamed on "yowies" in many photos etc would, basic physics taken into account, require a creature weighing in excess of 300kg and with arms / levers 2m long. I have spent a fair time analysing tool and weapon marks at a forensic level... I have not seen any pics of yowie damage that indicated tool marks, or teeth marks, excluding some of Dean and Lasso's more recent works (was it boonah? should find that link
) that seem to feature some seriously obvious tool/claw/teeth marks.

I believe in yowies. and cats. and other things. but... as I said to Mike W recently, we can only properly finish the puzzle at hand once we work out what pieces are in fact, from other puzzles entirely...

[Mike Williams]

Here is some more odd tree damage...in a valley..what was interesting was on top of the ridges where the wind ripped through..there was none..yet in the gully..and on both sides of a walking track..there was the tree damage..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZV6XnQZ1qJY

[SAB 8]

I`ve always found that tree bending one interesting!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDIFLYAsAwo