Tag Archives: log

More Logs Than the Average Beach Has

Taking a day off on a sunny day is such a lucky break early in the year.  Getting good weather is not guaranteed.  While my main goal was getting some Growler flying at Coupeville, when I had some spare time, I went down to Fort Casey and wandered along the beach.  The beach there has a ridiculous number of tree trunks that have washed up over time.  I don’t know why they end up here but, given how far up the beach they are, I assume the storms force them in this way.  Even getting past them to the shoreline requires some effort.  The almost endless number of them is quite amazing.

Federal Way Clock/Log

The city of Federal Way between Seattle and Tacoma is the end point of a project I am working on.  The transit center in the middle of the city is being rebuilt to accommodate the light rail system’s arrival and that includes the parking garage that is currently there.  From the top of the garage, you get a good view of the work underway.  You also get a close up view of a slightly unusual clock.  It is designed to look like it is a giant log with a clock built in.  It clearly isn’t wood but it is a little different!

Unusual Patterns on an Old Log

I was walking along the shore and saw a log that had clearly been in the water and then out of it for a long time.  All sorts of things had happened to the wood.  Some of it looked like it had worn away while other marks suggested that creatures had been chewing their way through.  Some wildlife was still clearly living on the surface and in the nooks and crannies.  It was such an unusual looking log I just couldn’t avoid taking some pictures.

That’s a Big Log!

Seeing logs on the shore is not unusual.  Plenty of logs get washed ashore.  However, when taking a walk along the beach at Shoreline over the holidays, there was a tree trunk that had become lodged on the water’s edge.  It had become wedged in amongst some piles in the water with the roots of the log still out in the water.  Usually the logs appear to have been cut but this was a tree that had got washed out into the sound.  Everyone was taking a look at it or climbing out on to it.  It was pretty big and finding a way to convey the size was something I pondered at length.

Tree Stumps on the Beach (With Frost)

Walking along Long Beach in Tofino early in the morning, it was still pretty cold.  The lack of wind meant it was perfectly comfortable in the sun but the air temps were low.  The result was lots of frost on the tree stumps that were scattered along the beach.  The texture of the cross section of the wood was already accentuated by weathering but the addition of the frost provided a bit more emphasis to the surface.

 

Log Feeding New Life

I am regularly fascinated by the way in which a fallen tree will be the source of food for new plants.  The decaying wood releases nutrients and provides a great base for the next generation.  Of course, as it decays further, the base may gradually disappear from under them.  In the interim, though, any number of plants will sprout and develop.  I came across one such log in Meerkerk Gardens.  It seemed to be home to any number of new plants (and that ignores the insect species that were, no doubt, hard at work on its surface).

Beach Driftwood

Wood on the shoreline is usually pretty interesting from a texture perspective.  Spending a bunch of time in the water getting beaten by waves and any other debris in the water tends to smooth out the surfaces and also emphasize the flaws in the structure of the wood.  I saw a bunch of wood on the beach at Shoreline when walking along the shore there and one in particular caught my eye.

Logging on a Big Scale

Before tourism became a big feature of Snoqualmie, it was a logging town.  Much of the Pacific Northwest was in the lumber business providing vast amounts of timber to the country as a whole.  Lumber is still important but it is nowhere near the business it once was.  The trees they were cutting in those days were very old and had grown to significant dimensions.  As they cut through the growth, the trees they were cutting were getting smaller.  In the center of the town they have an exhibit that includes a stand that was used for cutting the timber.  In it is included a log.  This thing is huge.  Bear in mind that they were often much larger than this and you will see just what sort of trees they were cutting in those days.