Was delighted when I saw this part of the tree…it looks like a naked belly!!
Taken on Pender Island, near Victoria & Vancouver, Canada.

Canon 400D
Tamron 28-75
‘As is’

FEATURED in:

Canon DSLR, December 2008
Photographers of Canada, January 2010
Beautiful BC, April 2013

CHALLENGES

WINNER, Trees – Trees as People, May 2010
TOP TEN, Accidental Images – Trees You Just Want to Hug, September 2010
WINNER, Monochrome – BIZARRE things you find in NATURE, March 2013

The Arbutus tree can live to 500 years old and grow up to 100 feet tall and ten feet wide. They can grow with little soil and survive the harshest west coast storms in the winter withstanding high winds and pounding ocean waves.
T he Arbutus can store water in burls growing from its trunk thus releasing water when needed. The tree can allow branches and parts of its trunk to slowly die off so the rest of the tree can live therefore surviving droughts and catastrophes.
It is a deciduous tree (a tree with leaves) that does not follow the common habit of shedding leaves in the winter. New leaves grow and old ones die still, but there is never a moment with no leaves. This is rare. The new year brings anticipated by many locals as the Arbutus can change the look and smells of a whole coastline during the spring when the trees are decorated in white blossoms.

In the summer, the reddish brown bark sheds its skin just like a bad sunburn. The bark curls up in slivers eventually falling to the ground so new greener bark can grow turning red again in the winter.