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In the past 6 months, Seattle has gone from near-drought condition to very wet. I can only describe the experience of watching the mosses in the area around my

by pnathan 11y ago

In the past 6 months, Seattle has gone from near-drought condition to very wet. I can only describe the experience of watching the mosses in the area around my apartment building go from dessicated to luminescent green as sublime. Particularly visible has been the mosses that live right off my back porch. In August, they had turned the color of dirt; today, they are a particularly aggressive almost-neon green with hints of yellow. The concrete around a (rather sad) tree and bush by the entrance has gone from a pale grey to a green-grey as the mosses have come back. I can quite fathom why mosses are a big thing! edit: if someone has read "Mosses, my dear friends"[1], I'd be curious as to the general content, whether photos, or details, or a travelogue, etc. I don't read Japanese, sadly. :-/ http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%82%B3%E3%82%B1%E3%81%AF%E3%81%A8%E3%82%82%E3%81%A0%E3%81%A1-%E8%97%A4%E4%BA%95-%E4%B9%85%E5%AD%90/dp/4898153097 http://www.amazon.co.jp/%E3%82%B3%E3%82%B1%E3%81%AF%E3%81%A8...

Avshalom 11y ago
The waterfalls in the northwest make for absolutely stunning mossy walls. Oneota down in the Columbia Gorge is amazing in the summer (possibly also the winter but it's a bit cold to be traipsing up a river then)
- c22 11y ago
  For the last couple years I've been having fun building my own moss walls with this stuff: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypertufa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypertufa
girzel 11y ago
I come from Seattle, but haven't lived there for nearly two decades. For some reason, I seem to have spent the intervening time in desert-like climates (central California, the Middle East, northern China). The dampness of Seattle -- in particular the proliferation of moss and fern -- has become a symbol to me of life and health. I remember once being in Wadi Rum, in Jordan, and amid the totally parched desert finding a deep crevice in a cliff, and way back in the heart of it there was a tiny, tiny trickle of dampness, and maybe a couple of square feet of moss and fern. Just the tiniest little patch, but delicate and absolutely beautiful. And another time being in the Hoh Rain Forest, on the Olympic Peninsula near Seattle, and looking at a little rill of water that cut through the soil, edged with a profusion of overhanging ferns and mosses, the water completely crystal, and not a hint of death or corruption anywhere. Even the rot was full of life. How lucky I am to come from a place where water really does mean life! (And not like the Amazon, where there is water, and life, but much of it is the kind of life that can poison you or inject eggs under your skin or swim up your urethra.)

by pnathan 11y ago

Avshalom 11y ago

The waterfalls in the northwest make for absolutely stunning mossy walls. Oneota down in the Columbia Gorge is amazing in the summer (possibly also the winter but it's a bit cold to be traipsing up a river then)

c22 11y ago
For the last couple years I've been having fun building my own moss walls with this stuff: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypertufa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypertufa

girzel 11y ago

I come from Seattle, but haven't lived there for nearly two decades. For some reason, I seem to have spent the intervening time in desert-like climates (central California, the Middle East, northern China). The dampness of Seattle -- in particular the proliferation of moss and fern -- has become a symbol to me of life and health. I remember once being in Wadi Rum, in Jordan, and amid the totally parched desert finding a deep crevice in a cliff, and way back in the heart of it there was a tiny, tiny trickle of dampness, and maybe a couple of square feet of moss and fern. Just the tiniest little patch, but delicate and absolutely beautiful. And another time being in the Hoh Rain Forest, on the Olympic Peninsula near Seattle, and looking at a little rill of water that cut through the soil, edged with a profusion of overhanging ferns and mosses, the water completely crystal, and not a hint of death or corruption anywhere. Even the rot was full of life. How lucky I am to come from a place where water really does mean life! (And not like the Amazon, where there is water, and life, but much of it is the kind of life that can poison you or inject eggs under your skin or swim up your urethra.)