There are many trees in Canada but this one is possibly "The Tree". This highly flagged Tree is quite possibly the most photographed individual tree in Canada if not the world. As I promised while I painted #2008 "Killbear Flagged Tree Point", I had decided to paint that tree someday. That day turned out to be Tuesday December 12th, 2017. We had 20 cm of snow at Singleton so it was a studio day for me.
It is much better to be a flagged tree than a broken one. One needs to grow with the elements rather to be constantly at war with the forces that shape nature. In German, krummholz or krumholtz is the name for the type of stunted, deformed vegetation encountered in subarctic and subalpine tree line landscapes. In German "krumm" means crooked, bent and twisted while "holz" is the word for wood. These stunted trees are shaped by continual exposure to fierce, freezing winds and can only survive where they are sheltered by rock or snow cover. As the lower portion of these trees continues to grow, the coverage becomes extremely dense near the ground. In Newfoundland and Labrador, the formation is known as tuckamore.
The clumps of vegetation on the granite point provide vital shelter for the snakes that frequent Killbear Provincial Park. I encountered a rather large and beautiful eastern fox snake. The eastern fox snake is endangered. The populations are doing well on the inaccessible rocky islands offshore in Georgian Bay but apparently these snakes leave their island sanctuaries for the mainland to select breeding sites. They often swim 10 kilometres or more in straight lines in order to mate. Once on the mainland, these long snakes are susceptible to humans. After mating they return to their island homes.
The Tree was anchored in almost no soil in a crack chiselled in the granite. The prevailing onshore winds had flagged it over time so that it grew more horizontally than vertically. I was just one of many people who took pictures of that tree. This view with the sun on my back shows the true colours of the tree and would be my vantage had I been able to complete this en plein air. The more typical view pictured is looking south toward The Tree which means you would be looking at the shadowed and dark side.
Months later I was still chuckling about Tom Thomson arriving to do the special guest presentation at the Killbear Amphitheatre on that evening in late August. I scratched my signature into the thick wet paint on the very smooth and slippery panel.
It is much better to be a flagged tree than a broken one. One needs to grow with the elements rather to be constantly at war with the forces that shape nature. In German, krummholz or krumholtz is the name for the type of stunted, deformed vegetation encountered in subarctic and subalpine tree line landscapes. In German "krumm" means crooked, bent and twisted while "holz" is the word for wood. These stunted trees are shaped by continual exposure to fierce, freezing winds and can only survive where they are sheltered by rock or snow cover. As the lower portion of these trees continues to grow, the coverage becomes extremely dense near the ground. In Newfoundland and Labrador, the formation is known as tuckamore.
The clumps of vegetation on the granite point provide vital shelter for the snakes that frequent Killbear Provincial Park. I encountered a rather large and beautiful eastern fox snake. The eastern fox snake is endangered. The populations are doing well on the inaccessible rocky islands offshore in Georgian Bay but apparently these snakes leave their island sanctuaries for the mainland to select breeding sites. They often swim 10 kilometres or more in straight lines in order to mate. Once on the mainland, these long snakes are susceptible to humans. After mating they return to their island homes.
The Tree was anchored in almost no soil in a crack chiselled in the granite. The prevailing onshore winds had flagged it over time so that it grew more horizontally than vertically. I was just one of many people who took pictures of that tree. This view with the sun on my back shows the true colours of the tree and would be my vantage had I been able to complete this en plein air. The more typical view pictured is looking south toward The Tree which means you would be looking at the shadowed and dark side.
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