Recognizing the Holy Waters of a Sacred Spring : Exploring From The Headwaters Into The Heart of Fairy Creek
Part three of a three part series describing my experiences and what I learned while exploring the Fairy Creek ancient forest watershed on Vancouver Island in 2025
(The following is part three of a three part series on Fairy Creek, you can read part one of the series here and part two of the series here)
I invite you to come on an adventure with me to witness the most biodiverse ecosystem in the region now known as Canada through my lens. The ancient temperate rainforest watershed we will be exploring together in this post contains a greater quantity life than the Amazon rainforest per acre (and it took multiple millennia for that forest to become what it is today).
It was humbling to be in the presence of ancient learned and resilient beings like you will see in the many pictures below. The experience I had in that extremely rare valley showed me that what our ancestors expressed about Sacred Groves and Sacred Springs were not some “pagan” superstitions of “primitives”, these were astute observations of facets of the Creator’s design for that which heals, nourishes and teaches us on a deep level.
The spring shown in the video below is one of the few that remain within the nation state of Canada that is born not only within a sacred grove of trees, but nourished, protected and enlivened by an entire watershed of ancient forest from mountain top to mountain top. I have no doubt that my ancestors would have recognized this place you are about to witness below as a Sacred Spring and this place would have been protected under Brehon Law.
Holy Water is the water directly created by the living architecture of the Creator’s design within his original cathedrals that are grown, not built by men. This living water is birthed by both the living Earth herself and due to the thousand gifts of symphony of beings converging in tandem to become a spring like this. This water is encoded with the truth, ancient memory and visions for what can be. She is a flowing expression of love that is felt by both the Living Earth herself and the Creator of all things for all of their children (including humanity).
This water is infused with beams of starlight gathered in the ten million dew drops on each moss and lichen covered giant that protects and nourished this realm. Drops of liquid light that fall down and are received by the living soil, enriched with the ocean nourishing minerals and the story of countless beings that are now remembered physically within that soil. Percolating through the soil she caresses the granite laced with crystals, taking her time to gather stories from the stone people and the heart of Gaia before returning to the surface of the Earth, here in this place you see below, glowing, brimming with lifeforce, crystal clear with her clarity of vison, moving with resplendent grace and reverence.
When I drank that water gushing up from the otherworld, birthed from this land that remembers how to be whole, how to be a home and how to nurture life onto its highest potential, I felt my body, heart and mind become filled with light and memory instantly. Imbued with all that the Creator intended for this place, the water quenched the thirst of the soul.
“The water reaches the ground and soaks through the cool earth. The redundant oxygen feeds the multitude of micro-organisms that are a crucial part of any healthy soil. Sinking into deeper layers the water cools down towards its anomaly point. Deep in the soil various chemical reactions — particularly with magnesium, calcium, and carbon dioxide - split the hydrogen and the oxygen and later, bind these elements together again, creating new water. This water does not carry old information patterns and is absolutely pure. It begins to rise and on its way absorbs information and substances from the mineral world.
This juvenile water is sterile, distilled and devoid of so-called impurities. It has no developed character and qualities. It therefore absorbs the characteristics and properties of whatever it comes into contact with, such as trace elements, minerals, salts and even smells! Were we to just drink pure water, it would quickly leach out our store of minerals and trace elements, debilitating and ultimately killing us. This is why spring water is so much healthier than pure water which has been pumped directly from its source, as spring water has had time to complete its natural absorption process.
Trees in the cool forest absorb water from the soil and cool the soil’s upper layers. The laws of physics dictate that cold water is not found above warm water, so the new water rises towards the surface. Forests keep the ground water table high and also contain many springs. Here in the cool, diffused light of the forest the water begins its long, life giving cycle, winding its way towards the valleys, always shaded by green foliage. As long as it can, water avoids the harmful direct light of the Sun by shielding itself under overhanging vegetation. Conceived in the cool, dark cradle of the forest water transports its vital energies, minerals and trace elements to other environments and, ultimately, to the sea, from where clouds are born. And so the cycle continues.
The Forest - Cradle of Water Some of the young water is absorbed by the vegetation. The tree makes use of the temperature differences to do this - during the day the inside of the tree is cooler than the air, and at night the tree is warmer than the air. Thus, in the daytime water rises easily into the crown. When crown and trunk cool down the roots warm up and vice versa. In effect the ground is kept warm at night and in the winter, and kept cool in the day and during the summer. This stabilization of soil temperature is vitally important for beneficial soil micro-organisms.”
This valley has no trail, no signs of industrial or human activity of any kind. It is an ancient rainforest watershed that has the full pre-colonial spectrum of animal, plant and fungi biodiversity intact (including wolves, marbled murrelets grizzlies, Northern goshawk, hundreds if not thousands of species of Fungi, Coastal Cutthroat trout, Rainbow Trout, Chinook (King), Coho (Silver), Sockeye (Red) Salmon, wolverines, Rufous hummingbirds, Bald Eagles, Spotted owls, black bears, River Otters, Yellow-breasted chat, Lettuce lichen , Northern red legged frogs, Fishers, Marten, wandering salamanders, Roosevelt Elk, mountain lions and many more).
Take a walk with me to see what forests looked like all along the coast of what is now called “BC”, “Washington” and “Oregon” before industrial pillaging began about 200 years ago. You will essentially be stepping into a time machine, as through these pictures you are seeing the same beauty and expression of the Creator’s design for wholeness and health fully intact, as it was seen here by humans for millennia into the past.
looking back up towards the mountainside into the dense rainforest from about 100 feet from the valley middle
As we approached the heart of the top of valley (where I recorded that video above) the amount of large polypore fungi increased on the trees, huge Reishi mushrooms, Amadou mushrooms, and others clung to the thousand year old trunks of hemlock and other trees. As we got closer to the river bed, we could hear the sound of trickling water in the distance, and the light began to filter down through the giant thousand year old cedars, illuminating the branches and the moss, showing little speckles of blue shining through above, like stained glass windows in a cathedral.
After hiking about 500 feet down the dry creek bed where you could hear the water moving deep underneath in the granite, we came to the first place where the water emerged from underneath the moss covered granite boulders in an adjacent tributary bubbling up crystal clear, vividly alive water, moving on the surface of the granite boulders, gathering its force and moving downstream inviting us to follow its flow.
this is what it looked like as the mountainside levelled out when we were approaching the place where the video above was recorded.
Blueberry bush growing out of the side of an ancient Red Cedar about 25 feet up the trunk. I expressed that there no words to describe the feeling of being in the presence of these beings. One has to experience it directly or they will never understand the spiritual gifts these rooted elder beings offer humanity in a recent note. Amanda Rouse shared her description as “being in the presence of great and gentle Beings of Heart may evoke Suspension of Time, with Awe, and Gratitude. Which I’d consider to be a shift in State of Being…Beyond Human”. Well said Amanda.
looking into the deep forested mountain side down the valley from about 50 feet from the middle of the valley (where the video above was captured.)
At any given moment when you are in the heart of that valley, you can peer into the forest on all sides of the creek and see only truth and medicine for the spirit. It is such a relief for the eyes, having been so often tortured by the oppressive soulless world of right angles and boxes we live in as “civilized” humans. This reprieve was so refreshing to the mind and heart, it quenched the thirst of the soul through beauty you drank up with your eyes.
Amazing Fungi were present and they both provide medicine and accelerate the transition of freshly fallen logs from windstorms into nurse logs that can support the next generation of cedars, hemlock and fir.
Mycologists would no doubt be able to identify new species in this place as the stories the rocks tell me say this valley was a Refugium during the last ice age and contains a spectrum of beings that is vast and many of which are yet unknown to science.
one of the many unique fungal beings I crossed paths with at the top of the Fairy Creek valley.
I do not know the names of these fungal beings, but they certainly had many stories to tell.
From the position of where the spring emerged from the granite and under the roots of the ancient trees, there was a nice gradual incline on the land, and the forest around it had many nurse logs. These logs, being the bodies of fallen giants that had given their lives back to the earth had now become the home for the next generation of hemlock, fur, and cedar, setting down roots in the rich decomposing substrate. Infused with biochar from surviving multiple lighting fires the nourishment that is the result of breathing in air, starlight and stone for millennia, what had once made up the thousand- year old body standing 200 feet tall becomes a nurse log. These homes for new life tells the story of how leaving these forests to do their natural cycles creates a perpetual enrichment of soil, biodiversity, and resilience.
This is not “wasteful” or “decadent” as some ignorant people or logging corporation propaganda will attempt to tell you, this is an incredibly eloquent system that unfurls into a blossoming ecosystem becoming ever more resilient and biodiverse.
This picture was taken about 20 - 30 feet into the woods past the creek bed shown in the video above. As you can see, fallen giants become extremely important contributors to the health of this community by gifting their bodies to become nurse logs for the next generation of future giants to find sturdy footing and nourishment.
These next three pictures show you trees that were born on nurse logs and nurse stumps (from naturally fallen trees). They develop strong roots that reach down below the stump or log they are born on and into the soil below (so they can gather nourishment from both the soil and the decomposing woody material). After the log or stump has completely transformed into living soil and disintegrated the trees born on their once elevated germination positions become truly unique trees with thick root structures elevating them above the forest floor/ This sometimes gives them the appearance as though they are walking through the forest with roots for legs. It also provides extremely important habitat for bears, wolverines, fishers, racoons, foxes and other beings to shelter.
a family of young hemlock that began their lives on a wind thrown cedar stump
ancient fir that began her life on a nurse log or stump centuries ago (notice the space underneath the massive roots )
same tree, close up showing cavity in healthy roots created via this tree having germinated on a nurse log or stump centuries ago.
showing the upper shoulder of a massive root structure of the same tree, and how it becomes a habitat for many other beings, including ferns
Despite the extreme steepness of the mountain side, we had just descended, this was a place of very little disturbance to the soil. This is thanks to the gifts of the millennia old hemlock, cedar, and fir that reached their roots deep into the ground at mountainside, connecting to each other through mycorrhizae networks, where there was disturbance from a fallen branch that had shaved away the thick moss on the forest floor, you could see a deep black humus rich soil, very fragrant with the humic acid and medicinal aerosols released from the fungi, lichen, moss and roots.
This is what rocks look like inside the ancient rainforest on a mountain side on Vancouver Island.
a middle aged hemlock that was apparently knocked down in an intense windstorm revealed the soil structure held by the roots, packed full of Biochar from multiple forest fires spanning back centuries. I dug down 2 feet into the soil beneath and found intermittent layers of biochar. This tells the story of a forest that is both forest fire resistant (
Above you can see a middle aged hemlock (maybe 300-400 years old) that was apparently knocked down in an intense windstorm. The exposed roots revealed the soil structure held by the roots, packed full of Biochar from multiple forest fires spanning back centuries. I dug down 2 feet into the soil beneath and found intermittent layers of biochar. This tells the story of a forest that is both forest fire resistant (elder trees are spaced out and with thick enough bark that they always survive) and forest fire enriched (younger and/or dead standing trees that are ignited by lightning strikes burn, spreading fire for a few hundred feet into other smaller trees at most, after being extinguished by the gifts of the ancient giant trees, allowing biochar to enrich soil, seeds to be activated that need fire/ash and increasing biodiversity while preventing catastrophic forest fires). As I documented in the previous installment of this series, that forest fire resilience was expressed all the way up the ancient forested mountainside as well.
another via of the downed tree, moss and decomposition indicating it has been there for years.
close up of the exposed soil that was pulled up by the roots of the downed tree above from deep in the Earth below the tree. Notice the pieces of charcoal
When you look closer at the soil in one of the few disturbed areas, you could see many little speckles of biochar that is ancient charcoal that is the result of natural forest fires resulting from lightning on a small area of the forest, raining down onto the forest floor and becoming incorporated as part of the soil matrix for hundreds of years to thousands of years. This is one of the ways through which ancient old growth forests, in particular on the West Coast that remain wet due to their symbiotic relationship with the moss, the lichen, and the ocean mist, are able to use forest fires to their advantage. They put out the fires as they start, as their thick bark and wide spacing allows for only the smaller and dead trees to burn for a couple hundred feet of forest fire, after which all of that charcoal is allowed to incorporate into the soil, but the fire is not allowed to spread to the point where it is catastrophic and causing damage to the larger community. This is one of the reasons why it is so important to protect these ancient forests because they are forest fire resilient soil building ecosystems.
close up of the mossy forest floor adjacent to Fairy Creek right below the sacred spring
The ancient temperate rainforest of Vancouver Island is a world of fractal layers of life woven together in a seamless web. This image and the following short video clip shows the surface of the log. Putting your face a few inches from the log you enter into a miniature forest with trees made of moss towering over a forest floor of different smaller mosses.
Zoom your awareness out and you see towering blueberry bushes dripping in morning dew hundreds of times taller than the moss forest. Zoom out yet again and you see 200 foot tall ancient sentinel Fir, Cedar and Hemlock looking down at you lovingly (each covered in moss and some with blueberry bushes growing 50 feet up their trunks or on giant mossy branches with their own ferns.
Each being is creating an ecosystem for others, each part of a larger ecosystem, each offering their gifts to enrich the whole they are a part of… resulting in resplendent biodiversity, beauty and abundance.
It takes millennia for places like this to achieve that balance, but the fact that a few of them still exist on a watershed scale is huge, as it means we have the ancient memory of the trees, their symbiotic template and the full spectrum of biodiversity present that can help the rest of the land and younger trees remember how to be whole and healthy again.
These places are reservoirs of the Creator’s wisdom and we must protect them at all costs.
(my iphone was set on “live” mode for pictures so this accidentally resulted in me getting a bunch of 2 second clips of our hike, such as the one above. I’ll share those below to hopefully allow you to feel the vibe of the terrain and atmosphere with more depth than photos can offer. I am just sharing this now so that you do not click on the videos and get disappointed by only 2 seconds of footage. Though, some of the videos shared below will be longer too)
As you look up from close down on the forest floor, which is covered in a thick bed of moss and lichen, you see blueberry bushes and huckleberry bushes also covered in old man’s beard and moss, gleaming with dewdrops from the morning fog that has been sequestered, also shining with brightly with colorful purple and bright red berries, full of nutrition and life force. It’s hard not to snack on them constantly as you walk your way forward into this ancient cathedral of magnificent proportions.
blueberry bush growing right out of the granite, in the creek bed, having grown there for many years, this being is no doubt mainly nourished mycorrhizally and via the mineral rich living waters and has very little rhizosphere contact with actual soil. In the flood season, this bush would be totally underwater. I saved many seeds and they will be going in my Refugium projects.
Whether you are looking very closely at the moss and lichen on the forest floor, the glowing blueberries or huckleberries in the morning everything is glistening with pure droplets of sequestered ocean mist. The young trees being assisted by the ancient ones to reach up to the light through their mycorrhizal connections or the ancient beings reaching hundred hundreds of feet into the air, absorbing the forest mist and being orchestrators of life you are very aware of the presence and will of the creator of all things in this place.
Ancient Yellow Cedar and Hemlock in the heart of Fairy Creek
This is why I describe this space as a cathedral, not only for its magnificent beauty in the visual capacity in that you look up through the canopy and it looks like you’re looking at stained glass windows, but because you can feel the original architecture of the Creator here, you can see it written in the relationships between the ancient trees and the mountain, the lichen and the moss , the ocean fog and the blueberry bushes, the trickling water and the regenerative lighting fires.
These are truths that are accessible and perceptible to all.
ideal nesting habitat for old growth dependent owls and birds
zoomed in picture of the branches of an ancient Hemlock on the bank of Fairy Creek in the upper valley. I have no doubt that some of the moss and lichen beings on that tree have been alive more more years than I have this time around
The biodiversity on a single tree in this valley where so many beings (such as lichen and moss) ally with trees via drinking up the ocean fog is astounding.
Ancient forest watersheds like Fairy Creek are cathedrals that are built over multiple millennia. They are built through the conscious will of the Creator of all things in collaboration with the being Creator imbued with a spirit and a will of her own, the tending, magnanimous and patient being called earth.
These spaces represent the peak expression of what symbiosis and the original design for abundance and health can look like when you look up at the 1000 year old plus Cedars hemlock and fir, you are looking at the preachers of the cathedral. Their arms outstretched to the heavens giving praise, receiving manna from the heavens and then sharing it will all that share that space as kin.
They do not preach the scriptures written by man. They preach the scripture of life, and what lifeforms can achieve when they collaborate with one another over millennium. They preach through living by example, showing us how life forms can work as a symphony, each offering notes that bring added beauty and harmony to the whole. They teach us when they put their gifts to use for the betterment of their community, when they connect symbiotically, and show us the truth of Creator’s design when the reciprocal gifts move in an endless cycle, enriching that community in perpetuity, fostering new life to unfold, gathering and gifting the sacred waters.
In many places on Earth, people have learned the hard way what happens when you destroy the ancient forests that protect and breathe life into the springs as in places like Ireland, Scotland, India, Ethiopia and Australia, springs (and wells built on pre-colonial sacred springs) that once flowed strongly within old growth forests have now dried up (since the forests were felled and replaced with monoculture tree farms).
“There was once a well known spring in Salzkammergut, Austria. The water was highly charged and rich in trace elements, and it did not freeze in the winter. The colder the air, the warmer the water was: at -30°C (-22°F) the water had a temperature of up to +10°C (50°F). However, on very hot summer days the water temperature came close to the anomaly point of +4°C (39°F). During World War I, clear-felling operations were carried out 600-800 meters below the spring.
The following year the spring began to dry up. The rare herbs and tall grasses that had flourished around it disappeared. Next, the chamois which drank from the spring became ill and mange, a disease rarely found in that area, wiped them all out. The only surviving small groups of chamois lived near to similar springs. According to Schauberger, they needed the highly charged water to charge their blood in order to live at such Alpine heights.
However, the trail of suffering does not stop with the disappearance of springs. Brooks flowing through clear-felled wasteland lose their temperature balance, and become raging torrents. Natural brooks do not destroy their bed nor do they flood, even after heavy downpours, but by removing the forest brooks can no enger keep their beds clean. The water’s current, weakened by over-heating, increasingly fails to transport sediments from the bottom of the riverbed, and it fills up with stones and mud. The flow forces, which naturally concentrate the movement of the water towards the centre of the stream, are diverted to the outside and undermine and destroy the riverbanks. Artificial measures, embankments and straight linear channels only worsen the situation. Forcing water to flow in an unnatural, straight line only accelerates its degeneration. The vegetation-less riverbanks and the surrounding, eroding wastelands add even more water to the damaged riverbed. Man therefore broadens the channel, thereby exposing even more water to the Sun’s heat. The vicious circle goes on ...
According to Viktor Schauberger, water subjected to these conditions loses its character, its soul. Like humans of low character, it becomes increasingly violent and aggressive as it casts about seeking to vent its anger and restore to itself its former health and stability (Coats 1998, 7). The chaos widens and natural disasters like catastrophic floods haunt the valleys and the deltas, while deforested mountains become uninhabitable because of avalanches and landslides.
In 1930, Viktor Schauberger, also stated: Without the forest, no water; without water, no bread; without bread, no life’ (Alexandersson 1990).”
For example, In Ethiopia’s northern highlands, the Tewahedo Church protects thousands of small, circular “church forests” that act as biodiversity hotspots in a largely deforested landscape (which was mostly clearcut by imperialists). These, often ancient forests are considered sacred, and frequently contain rare, life-sustaining freshwater springs that provide water flowing outwardly to local communities, particularly during dry seasons. This is a model we can replicate and expand on where we live.
Despite what the pro-clearcutting, profiteering government and corporate propaganda will tell you on the “news”, modern science has come up with a great many reasons why we should protect biodiverse habitats like this that are increasingly rare on the planet earth. However, materialistic and reductionistic science missed the point you can’t quantify the sacred and the reason why these forests still existed when the original Europeans arrived in mass was because these forests were viewed for what they are a community of beings possessing a spirit, intelligence, deserving of respect and reverence, simply by the fact that they are put there by the Creator to share their gifts.
The people that lived here before the Europeans arrived harvested trees, but they did not do so out of want. They did so for what they needed. They did not harvest the trees to sell for profit. They harvested the trees for what they needed to build their boats, their homes, their tools. And it was done so with reverence, with the ceremony, with a gift giving, of reciprocity and thanks.
This ancient cedar was struck by lightning but survived with a hole through the center.
There is no thanks when the corporations arrive to clear cut the forest. There is only taking extraction and replacing what God put here with a biodiversity depleted monoculture that will never become an old growth forest again in our lifetime, and likely not for well over a millennia.
“The drying up of mountain springs, the change in the whole pattern of motion of the groundwater, and the disturbance in the blood circulation of the organism – Earth – is the direct result of modern forestry practices.”
- Viktor Schauberger
Not only would we not see this forest expressed at this level of beauty and biodiversity again for millennia if it was clearcut, it would also kill the sacred spring that flows at the headwaters.
“..the trail of suffering does not stop with the disappearance of springs. Brooks flowing through clear-felled wasteland lose their temperature balance, and become raging torrents. Natural brooks do not destroy their bed nor do they flood, even after heavy downpours, but by removing the forest, brooks can no longer keep their beds clean. The water’s current, weakened by over-heating, increasingly fails to transport sediments from the bottom of the riverbed, and it fills up with stones and mud.
The flow forces, which naturally concentrate the movement of the water towards the center of the stream, are diverted to the outside and undermine and destroy the riverbanks. Artificial measures, embankments and straight linear channels only worsen the situation. Forcing water to flow in an unnatural, straight line only accelerates its degeneration. The vegetation-less river- banks and the surrounding, eroding wastelands add even more water to the damaged riverbed. Man therefore broadens the channel, thereby exposing even more water to the Sun’s heat. The vicious circle goes on..
According to Viktor Schauberger, water subjected to these conditions loses its character, its soul. Like humans of low character, it becomes increasingly violent and aggressive as it casts about seeking to vent its anger and restore to itself its former health and stability (Coats 1998, 7). The chaos widens and natural disasters like catastrophic floods haunt the valleys and the deltas, while deforested mountains become uninhabitable because of avalanches and landslides.”
And as some places created by man that are intended to be a place for being in reverence of the beauty of creators design, the living, ancient cathedral has holy waters as well, except in this ancient cathedrals, the holy water does not sit stagnant in a bowl.
“More energy is encapsulated in every drop of good spring water than an average-sized power station is presently able to produce.”
- Viktor Schauberger
The holy water of Fairy Creek
The holy water is gathered directly from creation, sequestered from the ocean mist, pulled in from the air by the ancient trees that reach up into the sky, covered in moss and lichen, their ancient allies to sequester the water molecules into droplets and gift them down into the rhizosphere into the living soil so the beings beneath can have a steady stream of this holy water, filtered down through the granite mountainside, trickling underneath as we hike towards the core of the valley, you could hear the holy waters moving alive, full of life force and purpose. And when we reached the creek bed and the ancient granite boulders, that told the stories of many millennia past, we could hear the water bubbling up from underneath the granite, gifted back to the community after it was sequestered above from the sky, flowing down through the core of the valley to become habitat for amphibians, salmon to provide drink for the animals, and to one at one point provide the gift of seeding the ocean with the iron that comes from the soil that moved through.
(video below shows another clip of the sacred spring at the headwaters of the valley)
This is true holy water, for it is in service of all creation and provides medicine for all and is accessible to all and we must protect it at all costs.
(short clip below shows further down the valley when I experienced a transcendent moment looking up into the trees, feeling the presence and will of the Creator of all things. I recorded this clip in that moment)
“Blessed are they who never read a newspaper, for they shall see Nature, and through her, God”
- Henry David Thoreau
One of the many lesser known gifts these ancient forests provide humanity is the medicine they gift us in the air.
Medicinal aerosols emitted by old growth trees alter human physiology (and all other mammal’s physiology) optimizing reproductive health and the function of our innate immune systems.
Footage below was recorded in the heart of the Ada’itsx (aka Fairy Creek) ancient rainforest watershed.
The air in that primary (never industrially disturbed) rainforest watershed was full of medicinal aerosols, each breath was sweet and cleansing, like a gentle smudging for one’s body, mind and spirit.
Not only does do the ancient forests produce a huge portion of the oxygen we need to live a long and healthy life, build soil and clean water, while supporting the foundation of ocean life (such as the salmon) thanks to Diana Beresford-Kroeger’s groundbreaking research into medicinal tree aerosols, we now know that human biology is also intertwined with and enriched by medicinal airborne molecules (emitted by trees) that travel thousands of kilometers (such as Terpenes and other Volatile Organic Compounds exuded from old growth trees) which impact the human immune system and reproductive health. The potential for the longevity and health of our human family is interconnected with these ancient forests. Our destiny is woven together with the fate of the Forests by the Creator in many ways. We can either use our gifts to strengthen and add beauty to that tapestry, or we can be guided by greed and begin to unravel the fabric that Creator put here to support us all in unlocking our true potential (each choice will have profound implications).
“Plant aerosols are new to modern medicine and to science; I was the first person to publish on tree aerosols. They are not, however, new to nature. This chemistry has always been present in the plant world, a unique means of communication in which the speaker is a plant, and the speech produced is a biochemical sheet of molecules. Each molecular form has a meaning attached to it, provoking a response from its receivers, be they pollinator, fly, ant, mammal, fish, or another plant or tree- even an entire forest ecosystem, if the call is loud enough, urgent enough.
An aerosol is a balloon in miniature, a carbon mainframe hat can carry other attachments, some big, some small. These are molecules constructed by nature to respond to the flow dynamics of the atmosphere, one form of nature’s public transport system. To understand how they work, picture a child’s birthday balloon. Tethered to the child’s hand or wrist, the balloon floats above the child’s head, restricted by its string until it is blown away by the wind, or let go in a moment of carelessness or curiosity. On release, there are always a few seconds when the balloon seems to hang there. Looking up at the colourful object, you wonder if it will ever take off. Then something happens and it goes. This “something” is the physics of flow, a phenomenon called “lift” in the aeronautical world. The action of lift depends on the design of the object, the force behind it and the current wind-speed properties of the atmosphere. The balloon takes off, floating up and up through the air. All of a sudden a giant flush of momentum carries the balloon sideways and out of sight.
Plant aerosol molecules are invisible to the naked eye, too small to be seen, but then so are the sound waves of speech. The human voice can be measured by vocal wavelengths. Similarly, aerosols can now be tracked by displacement in cloud chamber experiments and characterized or identified by gas chromatography.
As these molecules are studied in greater depth, they have begun to reveal their diversity. Some aerosols are tiny, others have a symmetry of shape to save energy, many more are bulky by molecular standards. These last need to be staged like rockets, losing weight to increase the momentum at liftoff, to become airborne. Still others carry the molecular form of a bullet. The remainder float and dangle like kites, with the same ingenious sail-like
Focus on each sense in turn, starting with sight. Your visual cortex registers an ordered disorder in the branches overhead. Nature’s masterpiece painted in green, a pastoral passage to the sky, swamps every sightline.
Hearing comes into play, with the fragile sweep of leaves in the canopies. There are no echoes in this verdant palace; sounds are muted and absorbed, clotted by the suberin within the trees-a substance that is an attenuator, pulling sound out of the air. Suddenly, a songbird calls from the timber nave. The air holds all the notes in place, hoarding them like treasure, then releases them. After this song, the stillness returns, threaded with silence. Then slowly, slowly, the web of infrasound, or “silent” sound, with its long, loping waves, reaches you, perceived with the chest rather than the ears. You breathe deeply, clutching it before it has gone.
As you begin to walk, smell rises with each footstep. It swirls up from the dark melanin in the skin of the forest floor. Breaking loose from their underground home, the odours pierce the air with the rich fruitiness of sweetened decay. The smell is so heavy you feel as though you could brush it with the tips of your fingers. It smells good enough to eat.
That’s when tastes ride in on the forest air, lush with lactones, travelling the wet passages of the mouth and nose, crowding the epiglottis, pressing on oral glands to express digestive juices. You enjoy the full taste of the trees, designs allowing them to float in moving air. These molecular kites come in two mirrored varieties; one design spins the kite to the left and the other to the right.
The aerosol language opens new windows into the workings of nature. All flying pollinators rely on aerosol messages from plants. The flower sends out this call from its female hub, usually in the form of a perfume, though one that may or may not be identifiable by the human nose. A pollinator will have no trouble recognizing it, however, and will hurry to the source. Meanwhile, the flower will already have switched on a series of guiding lights. One will show in polarized light, visible only to insects, while the other is a colour cascade of ultraviolet light. These brilliant systems act as a guide for the insects, first to geo-position the field and then to track the pollen source. The results rest on your plates, food for thought and fork.
Perhaps the greatest of the plant world’s chemical clarion calls, however, is the vernal language of the boreal forest system, the planet’s signal for spring. The boreal encircles the globe like a hat band or crown, a unique northern forest system spanning continents and countries, islands and peninsulas. The boreal is the workhorse of the planet, maintaining the oxygenation of the atmosphere.
Trees manufacture and release a substantial plume of bioactive medicinal aerosols, which becomes a lifeline of vastly important medicine for the planet. This invisible shield protects all mammals and also acts as an initiator of spring activity.
The enormous spring flush of aromatic aerosols ends in a global plume of airborne medicine.
These aerosols put the freshness into spring and a skip into the step of lovers. They target many aspects of the human body. They stimulate smooth muscles, those in the gut and other internal organs that are not under voluntary control, and they dilate the small arteries that feed blood to the sur- face of the body. They open the lungs to refine breathing. They lower blood pressure and inhibit the excess secretion of hydrochloric acid in the stomach. They improve the flow dynamics of red blood cells, meaning the labour of birthing is easier and inflammatory reactions are reduced. These aerosols also bring nasal vasoconstriction, which makes it more difficult for airborne viruses like colds, flus and other viral populations to enter respiratory pathways.
The fingers of the forests touch the atmosphere and dip into the human heart to keep it pumping. The song of the forest signals spring and health for the whole world. The forest system of the boreal, seen by so few people, has a profound effect on individual health. The plume of oleoresin aerosols will take physics a long time to examine in cloud chambers. Industrial medicine will take just as long to forge new artificial protective biochemicals from studying the boreal. But the ancient wisdom of nature is ready to teach us that we are all connected in a web of life.” (all we need to do is stop destroying these living libraries and storehouses of medicine that were put here by Creator).
- Diana Beresford-Kroeger “Our Green Heart: The Soul and Science of Forests”
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The video below shows when several springs had emerged from the boulders and were beginning to create a significant flow about 500 feet down from the spring I showed at the beginning of the post.
The boulders were telling so many stories of their own, having spent countless summer days in ancient desert canyons in the interior of BC admiring quartz infused boulders, I wish I would have been able to spent an entire day just documenting and connecting with stone beings.
As we began travelling down the creek bed from the sacred spring emergence point, we moved through the dew covered blueberry bushes and ferns walk on gorgeous granite boulders infused with quartz crystal running through the veins, telling stories, reaching back eons, and in the center of the creek bed, massive cedars tower and little islands where they are still holding on despite being in the center of a creek bed.
Below shows my brother having just discovered an island in he middle of the creek with gorgeous old growth cedars. This island would certainly be partially underwater during high water season, yet they have lived there for centuries… a testament to the resilience building power of symbiosis.
I recorded a short video clip of one of the giant cedars growing right in the middle of the creek bed so you can get an idea of the presence of one of these beings these guardians of the center of the Ferry creek Valley so majestic, so healing to be in their presence.
Check out what the tree looks like up close that my brother is admiring in the pic above in the video below:
a wider view of the magical island in the top of the Fairy Creek valley (water and creek bed visible on left through trees and right)
At the top of the valley, where the water just begins to converge, you can tell that in the hotter, drier months, this part of the creek bed remains dry, that you can hear the water trickling down underneath in the granite. It was only a couple feet hundred feet downstream that the water emerged onto the surface and began flowing on top of the granite.
this small panorama shot shows where the first two significant tributaries joined together about 1 km down the valley from where the spring emerged in the first video at the top of the this post.
Another few hundred feet downstream the stream decided to disappear under the granite again for a hundred feet or so then rose up again like magic.
About 1.5 km down the valley, after my mom took a rest and my little brother and I continued down the valley on our own we came across some giant ancient beings like the ones shown below.
Beings such as these are the norm in the heart of Fairy Creek. They have witnessed thousands of seasons and contain the genetic awareness of climate shifts, countless droughts, floods and catastrophic storms (and how to survive them). They are the living library of Alexandria for resilience for the future and we must protect them.
Cedars like the ones you see in the video below were present on the mountain side in Fairy Creek and very dominant down on the flatter terrain adjacent to the creek. It was truly mesmerizing and humbling to be in their presence.
The video below shows you one of the disappearing creek points and where the water emerges again.
The video below shows where the first significant tributaries birthed from the headwaters of Fairy Creek join together.
Here at the top of the Fairy Creek Valley, where the headwaters converge, the mossy trees reach down with their branches covered in lichen, beckoning to you, inviting you to go deeper into the valley, the golden light shines through the treetops, showing you glimpses of divine inspiration.
my brother dale, fellow uncharted ancient forest adventurer standing on a naturally fallen ancient hemlock (that most certainly makes for a helpful crossing bridge for bears and other beings in the high water season).
The video below shows what it looked like underwater a few feet from where this picture above was captured.
(FYI the audio is a bit intense, so you may want to lower volume)
Cedar, hemlock, and fir remain prevalent, and some of the largest cedars that you can see anywhere in the valley are here at the bottom, hugging the banks of the river. There are also beautiful old growth alder and big leaf maple completely covered in moss like a thick warm blanket all the way up their bark and reaching out on their branches where small little ferns are growing along the branches, however 100 feet up in the air ideal habitat for the unique beings, such as the marbled murrelet, bald eagles and spotted owl that call that place home.
old growth hemlock tree 100 feet up in the heart of Fairy Creek valley
Vancouver Island Wolves (not my photo, source). We witnessed signs of den sites and decapitated salmon near old growth tree cavities in Fairy Creek that were likely places these beings lived. We also witnessed tracks in the soil near the waters edge.
Vancouver Island Wolves (not my photo)
Vancouver Island Wolves (not my photo) we saw signs of these beings in Fairy Creek.
As we progressed down the heart of the valley the quantity of interesting Fungi growing on fallen logs increased, along with the quantity and diversity of old growth tree dependent epiphytes
One of the magnificent fungal beings I got to connect with in the heart of the Fairy Creek.
Very few humans venture into this part of the valley now a days and that is very perceptible not just visually, but energetically.
Each mossy branch ad fallen log was both a water sequestration mechanism and a community onto itself.
Above you can see my brother hiking along the creek bank. Each square foot of it could have been studied for a week in how biodiverse it is.
the side of the creek bed is magnificently diverse and forms a unique edge zone ecosystem of its own.
close up of moss on edge of Fairy Creek
Each fallen log was telling a story, and their presence within the creek was one of generosity, beauty and belonging. Ignorant humans will tell you fallen logs like this are a “mess” but the reality is that not only do they provide extremely important habitat for beings within the forest watershed, as scientists have recently discovered, they also gift large quantities of the critically important fulvic and human acid to the sacred waters, which binds to Iron and carries that life giving mineral out to the iron starved oceans, seeding the phytoplankton, kelp forests, whales and salmon runs, feeding beings all the way from eagles, to heron, orcas, bears and countless others.
Ferns dripping with sequestered ocean fog looked down at us with curiosity from giant mossy branches 100 feet above us where engendered birds nest.. the deep memory of the trees there pulsates through the living waters that cascade over quarts infused boulders and mossy logs and the beings that most human eyes cannot see looked through us into our core, weighed our hearts, allowed us to pass and made their welcoming presence known.
Beneath the watchful care of the elder forest sentries, the living waters flowed with purpose and knowing. The water is of a different type in rare places like this, not just spiritually speaking, but also in a quantifiable sense. The protection of the elder trees allows the water to remain at the anomaly point (the point of maximum density for water, which is approximately 4 degrees C). At this temperature this living water is at the transition point between a liquid and a solid, some have referred to this state as liquid crystal. The anomaly point of water also changes the way it moves in fluid dynamics that contain vortices of the Fibonacci sequence geometry. These internal flow dynamics have been shown to both inhibit pathogenic microorganism growth, prevent erosion of the riverbank and also make it easier for spawning fish to move upstream within these spiraling underwater flow dynamics.
“Of all known substances water is unique in the way it eludes the systems of intellectual science. It is exactly the extraordinary qualities of water that are the foundation of development and preservation of life on this planet’ (Hacheney) The scientist and inventor, Viktor Schauberger, said water is a living or- ganism with its own laws’ (Alexandersson 1990).
Nearly three quarters of the Earth’s surface is covered with water.
Similarly a human being is 60-75 per cent water — 70 per cent of our brain consists of water, 92 per cent of our blood and 99 per cent of all our metabolic processes are dependent on it. After examining living and dying blood cells (erythrocytes), the Austrian biophysicist, Karl Trincher, concluded: ‘The actual basis of life is the inter-cellular water and not the biological macro-molecules ... The secret of life lies in the water’.
(one of the sacred springs in the Fairy Creek watershed, brimming with life and ancient memory)
One of the secrets of water is its ability to form special macro-molecules, so-called clusters. Water molecules (H,O) have a tendency to socialize.
Owing to their particular shape and electrical charges water molecules link up via hydrogen (H) bridges, thus forming large groups of hundreds of molecules. It has been discovered that this ability to form clusters is used to encase other molecules, such as sugars, salts, proteins, acids or poisons. The water molecules completely enclose the other molecule, thereby making a copy of its shape. When the other molecule is filtered out, these clusters retain a perfect imprint of the ‘guest’ — and moreover, they carry its vibrational frequency and information.
In science, water is increasingly credited with possessing a memory.
Indeed, the gigantic number of possible variations of these geometrical cluster shapes could fill whole libraries with information. The complexity of events in water is so vast that, in 1997, the most powerful computing systems could only calculate the possible interactions of just eight water mole-cules; for example, at the National Centre for Supercomputing in Illinois, or at the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Centre, both in the United States, where such calculations were run (Kneissler 1997).
Crystal water
Water arranges its clusters in even bigger groups which take the form of the five Platonic bodies: the tetrahedron, the cube, octahedron, dodecahedron, and icosahedron. In Classical times, these were associated with divine energies and proportions, and with cosmic forces (planets). Water clusters have complex and stable structures, which are maintained in steams protected by old growth forests and bound by a very strong energy bond. Their degree of order is more akin to crystals - which have the highest order currently known about. Thus, water clusters are called fluid crystals.
(video above was captured with my waterproof Pentax camera in the heart of Fairy Creek, notice the toroidal vortices of highly oxygenated living water when I put the camera underwater)
These crystal water structures vibrate with high frequencies and send out a whole range of signals. They are also considered to be antennae for the reception of signals. Water has a tendency to cool down towards its anomaly point of +4°C (39°F). At this temperature its physical density is at its highest. The closer the temperature is to +4°C (39°F) the more complex the clusters become (between 300 and 400 molecules per cluster at 37°C (99°F), but up to 700 at +°C (39°F). Therefore the information density of the water is also at its highest.
Below +9°C (48°F) oxygen no longer promotes the life of pathogenic micro-organisms yet it allows for beneficial strains of probiotic bacteria to remain. Therefore, staying cool provides a hygienic environment as well as increased information density. Running streams always try to shade themselves, and for this they have a powerful ally: the forest.”
For more information on living water and how important forest protected watersheds are, watch the video below:
Below shows the point where my mom stopped to make lunch and my brother and I continued on downstream for another couple kilometers.
The point where the video above was recorded is circled in yellow below
upper middle of this pic shows an arrow depicting our rough hiking route on the previous day doing recon. Blue line shows out route on Day 2 when we entered into the heart of the valley and the blue circle shows where the two pictures and video below were captured.
One of the coolest and most mysterious things that we witnessed in Ferry Creek is the capacity of that water to become a disappearing stream at the top of the valley so you would have a solid flow of water moving down where you’re definitely wouldn’t want to step in the main flow of it because it could knock you over if you didn’t have solid footing. And then 100 feet away, all of that water just decides to completely disappear into the ancient granite. And then all of a sudden, you’re walking on dry boulders, you come 100, 200 feet down the stream, and the water re emerges, effortlessly flowing on the surface again. It had a really magical quality to it, the way that the water was just disappearing into another realm and then reappearing again, and each time in doing so, filtering itself and becoming even more infused with the life force and minerals.
My brother and I went as far as we could down the valley before we had to get turned around so we could make it back up out of the valley in time and I really wanna go back in there again and get all the way down through the core of the valley to document how the different trees shift in their species distribution and all the different beings that live in the bottom part of the valley. So I hope I get to do that.
The image below shows where we turned around to head back up to the headwaters.
This image shows where we chose to stop our trek down the creek bed (maybe 4-5 km down the creek bed from the head waters) and turn back so we would have enough time to get out that day. I never got to find where the water emerges on the surface and begins flowing again,
notice that anomalous phenomenon on/near the trunk of that mossy Hemlock middle right?
The heart of the Fairy Creek watershed was full of ancient Mother Trees.
“Mother trees have an effect on the oceans as well, as Katsuhiko Matsunaga and his team in Japan had confirmed. The leaves, when they fall in the autumn, contain a very large, complex acid called fulvic acid. When the leaves decompose, the fulvic acid dissolves into the moisture of the soil, enabling the acid to pick up iron. This process is called chelation. The heavy, iron-containing fulvic acid is now ready to travel, leaving the home ground of the mother tree and heading for the ocean. In the ocean it drops the iron. Hungry algae, like phytoplankton, eat it, then grow and divide; they need iron to activate a body-building enzyme called nitrogenase. This set of relationships is the feeding foundation of the ocean This is what feeds the fish and keeps the mammals of the sea, like the whale and the otter healthy.”
― Diana Beresford-Kroeger, To Speak for the Trees: My Life’s Journey from Ancient Celtic Wisdom to a Healing Vision of the Forest
Katsuhiko Matsunaga is a Japanese marine chemist, who has spent his life doing research that has shed light on the biogeochemical cycles of marine and freshwater environments. Some of this research has shed light on how forests are linked to the oceans in ways our ancestors had observed but we are only now beginning to understand.
In a 2002 article, Matsunaga helped demonstrate a correlation between bioavailable iron in the marine ecosystem, and multispecies phytoplankton growth. Phytoplankton are the basis of marine food webs. They are the primary producers, turning sunlight into energy, that provides zooplankton and fish with food and energy to be passed up the food chain.
Previous research by Matsunaga suggests that the type of bioavailable iron that helps fuel this primary productivity is born from, and strongly correlated with, the forest soils found in the catchments of rivers. In laymen’s terms the humic compounds and acids that form as leaf litter decays, bind with iron in the soil and are flushed into the river, then carried out into the ocean. This delivers the necessary bioavailable iron to the oceans, which are naturally low in iron, in a form that can be used by the phytoplankton.
They use it, they grow better and thus there’s a stronger foundation to the rest of the food web. This means a healthier ecosystem and more surplus fish to be caught.
Salmon are keystone species in Building ancient and resilient Forests. Rich in nitrogen/phosphorus/calcium from the sea, the rotting salmon flesh and bones fertilizes forest growth. Salmon promote forest health. Giant trees require nitrogen and minerals to grow massive canopies that shade the streams and absorb excessive rainfall. These help prevent flash-floods and mudslides from wiping out salmon-filled creeks. Humans that protect (and/or create / enrich) salmon habitat are initiating and/or aligning with a syntrophic feedback loop that can have immensely regenerative potential on the scale of entire forest ecosystems.
Above shows the beginning of our trip back up the streambed on our trek out from the core of the valley, back up to the sacred spring at the headwaters to where we would begin our ascent up the ancient forested mountainside and head back to civilization.
Above is a short clip with my mom and brother hiking ahead of me as we travel back up Fairy Creek towards the headwaters of the valley. Below is an enlarged pic from the same moment.
As we headed back up the creek bed, I stopped to record this clip in the same place where I had taken pictures of the fractal moss geometry earlier.
On our way back up, my brother and I took one of the different tributaries so that we could see some of the different trees on the other side of the valley and at one point I came across a waterfall that was pouring over a log in the most graceful way and in the middle of the two points where the river was joining onto each other, there was these gargantuan cedars just watching over the valley from right in the center, one of the most peaceful, tranquil, and nourishing scenes I’ve ever seen in my life.
I could’ve easily spent multiple days just sitting and being and meditating at that spot with that little waterfall and those giant cedars in the middle of the creek but we had to head back so we could get up before dark so I took some footage and here you can listen to a couple short clips of the waterfall above (and a longer one below) and get this footage of underneath the water, though it’s a little choppy, so forgive me for that, but to get a feeling for the place.
Below are some pictures of another marvelous fungal being I met near that waterfall shown in the video above.
At this position in the valley you could look in any direction and feel deeply nourished by what your eyes perceive. This place is sanctuary for the senses to recalibrate to the stimulus the Creator intended to nourish a healthy heart and mind.
elder cedar with two hemlock growing elevated on the trunk
the roots of an ancient red cedar close up
The full cycle of life was fully visible in this sacred valley from the 2000 year old yellow cedars to the freshly germinated Douglas Fir seedlings like you see in that picture below just beginning their journey in life (which could end up being more than a millennium if we protect the valley).
One of the many things I found to be profound to witness in ancient forests of south western Vancouver island was the deep relationship between the ancient trees and the stone.
Not only were the ancient trees holding together the steep mountain side made of granite (as you will clearly see in the pictures ahead when we make out ascent back up the mountain side to get out of the valley) but I also witnessed physical evidence of the trees literally shaping the stone with their roots.
For those not familiar with the magic that takes place within the rhizosphere (biochemically and electromagnetically speaking) tree roots are actually capable of working in conjunction with mycorrhizal fungi to exude mild acids, prying loose atoms from stone, essentially eating the stone and transforming it into part of their body (which will one day become soil).
Check out this granite boulder that clearly shows evidence of being shaped by the roots of a tall rooted being a long time ago (which has now turned into soil).
Tree roots work in alliance with microorganisms in the rhizosphere creating a highly active bio-geo-chemical zone that generates electrical, physical, and chemical interactions with surrounding rock facilitating nutrient uptake and weathering of stone (dissolving solid rock to access phosphorous, calcium and other minerals tied up in the stone). Roots also bioelectrical fields that work in combination with rhizosphere microbes, forming a biological electromagnetic interface to transform and absorb minerals, transmuting solid rock into a source of energy.
that cavity in this ancient stone is pretty obviously the same geometry as a tree root
Tree roots exude mild acids and other organic compounds that can actively dissolve stone, a process often termed chemical weathering or biochemical weathering (though recent soil science indicates there is also an electromagnetic function occurring at the root tips that those terms do not encompass).
Here are some of the variables that allow ancient trees to eat rocks and turn them into life giving soils for future generations:
- Organic Acids: Roots release low-molecular-mass organic acids (LMMOAs), including citric, oxalic, and malic acids, primarily at the root tips.
- Mineral Dissolution: These acids lower the pH in the surrounding soil (the rhizosphere), which dissolves minerals and releases bound nutrients like calcium, iron, and phosphorus.
- Fungal Collaboration: Mycorrhizal fungi, which often live in symbiosis with tree roots, also produce acids that penetrate and weather rock materials, such as granite.
- Conductivity: Recent research into the electrical properties of the rhizosphere has shown that roots and their associated fungal networks (mycorrhizae) possess electrical conductivity and polarization. This facilitates ion transport and augments the biochemical weathering of stone and nutrient uptake of its products.
- Physical Combination: In addition to chemical dissolution, roots perform mechanical weathering by growing into existing crevices and physically widening them as they expand.
As you can see, the stones in that valley are also givers of life, as they give their bones to become the living fabric that will support all other beings that call that place home (metamorphosizing into living soil and ocean nourishing water soluble minerals).
The layers of diverse life in that valley were profoundly beautiful, every boulder and cliff face was an ecosystem onto itself.
As we hiked back up, the core of the valley along the ancient boulders, and we approached the point where that sacred spring was bubbling up out of the earth, I looked up one last time to look at the beautiful moss hanging off the elders above before we begin our journey ascending back up the mountainside and back towards civilization.
This image below shows about 200 feet past where the sacred spring emerges in the center of the valley as we head back up the now dry creek bed towards the side of the mountain or we’ll begin our ascent through the ancient temperate rainforest.
The two pictures below show what it looks like when you step off of the creek bed and into the thick beginning of the ancient forested mountainside there is a lot of devil’s club. There’s also a prolific amount of berries currants, blueberries, huckleberries, and other berries. So while you do get wet from the dew covered leaves and sometimes get a little poke from the Devil’s Club, you also have nourishment all around you if you’re paying attention.
This image below is looking back down the beginning of the mountainside that we had ascended about 200 feet up the mountainside and you can see the thick moss covered trees in the background of a whole different level of symbiosis with the moss and lichens than when you get higher up into the valley.
Here you can see my brother looking at his GPS device. We were trying to see if we were following the same ascent path up the mountain side as what we came down. For a time, we followed almost the same path, but then we diverged and thankfully we did because we came across some groves of gorgeous hemlock and giant cedars on the way back up that we did not see on the way down. So that was a serendipitous happening of just going up and letting her intuition guide us back up to the ridgeline.
Above you can see my mom pointing to the right pointing out some kind of beautiful giant tree over there talking about bear habitat and erosion dynamics that was going on in the gully. You can take the girl out of the girl guides but you can’t the girl guide out of the girl. :)
Below shows about 500 feet after you’ve started ascending up the hill and it’s starting to get steeper so you can see that there’s some trees that are on a pretty extreme angle and they’re holding that mountainside together beautifully.
Below you can see the steepness increasing to the point where when you’re climbing over big fallen logs, you get quite a workout, but thankfully there’s a ton of blueberries and huckleberries all around you so you can stop for a little snack and take a break whenever you need to.
Here, my mom was contemplating a new ascent route that was diverging from our original path where we came down the mountain. We came up to a gully and then we were heading up towards the left going up towards the headwaters at the ridge on the east side of Ferry creek.
If you hear me breathing hard in these little video clips, keep in mind, we had already descended above 3000 feet in elevation down the steep mountainside, hiked a few kilometers down the core of an ancient rainforest watershed (across the boulders and over logs) stopping and heading back up the valley and we’re beginning our ascent. I was pretty winded and I was feeling it on the way back up and I had to stop, every 100, 200 feet just to take a breather. But thankfully I had an excuse, which was to admire all the beautiful lichen and moss on the trees!
So here are some close up shots I took while I was taking a little breather and just looking really close at the worlds within worlds that are present on the lower half of the ascent of the east ridge of Ferry Creeks headwaters.
One of the coolest things that becomes very apparent as you’re hiking and having to hold onto these trees so that you can hold yourself up as you’re climbing up the steep mountainside is you get a very close look at how the moss and the lichen grows in a specific geometrical pattern on the trees to sequester atmospheric moisture, condense it into droplets, and then drop it down into the rosphere of the trees. So these are symbiotic organisms that are living on the trees. They’re benefitting the trees, they’re giving a home for themselves. They’re also exuding mild, organic acids that would fight off pathogenic organisms from attacking the tree. So they’re almost like part of the microbiome of the tree above ground. So you have the rhizosphere underground with all those beneficial organisms, and then you have all these beings that are living on the trees in the temperate rainforest serving as their microbiome above ground.
In the images below you can see about halfway up the mountainside where the steepness starts to get pretty intense and the blueberry bushes I would describe more as trees, they were ranging from six to 10 feet tall and often had a bonsai shape and were growing old man’s beard and lichen on them and would tower over top of you as you’re climbing up there and you could look up and see a bunch of glistening berries right above your head.
Now about halfway up the mountainside, we came across a few groves of really big cedars and hemlock and their spacing was just beautiful to behold. You could tell that the way that they were spaced out, they would not allow forest fire to pass and you could see evidence in the bark that these trees had seen fire. Some centuries ago because huge patches of lichen and moss had grown over the charred bark And then underneath them was this beautiful blueberry and huckleberry forest that you can see.
The ancient hemlock shown below has seen significant fire events in his long life and helped to put out those fires along with his widely spaced elder kin.
Here you can see an excellent example of something I’ve discussed in the other post from the series on Ferry Creek in that one of the very prevalent symbiotic relationships between the ancient residents there is between the hemlock and the cedar. So these trees will often become elders growing in close conjunction with each other, holding each other together, strengthening each other’s resilience against wind and erosion. And I’m sure there’s some kind of very specific symbiotic interaction going on in their roots because they seem to thrive, especially well when they’re right close together, like these giants here on the steep mountainside holding together the mountainside, dissolving the rock and turning it into their bodies, turning it into the life-giving soil, and feeding all of the ocean life, giving that iron that comes from the decomposing matter to the water, which flows out to the ocean, becoming the kelp forest, becoming the salmon run, which comes back up to them with the eagles, with the bears to nourish them to get to this size. This takes millennia for these relationships to become in place, and if we remove all the ancient trees in an area that relationship and that symbiotic flow will not return for multiple millennia, and that is if humans leave it alone.
On our way back up, we came across some elder hemlock trees that had died either via lightning strike or some other cause and they were home to some beautiful giant polypore fungal beings Not sure what type they were, but I can tell you that they were really old and beautiful.
Below, you can see my mom and brother hiking through the blueberry cloud forest towards another pair of cedar and hemlock giant ancient beings covered in moss. It was hard not to stop and admire them every 20 to 100 feet when we came across a pair like this, but we needed to get out in time, so we pressed on.
One of the most beautiful and profound things we witnessed about 2/3 of the way up that mountainside was the Gargantuan ancient red cedars that were fully healthy, fully intact with their bark and their root structure that had a root structure shape that allowed for a bare den to exist right underneath of it.
This tree here is one example of that. So one might say that these are erosional features or that the bear dug in there, but I could look closely at the opening to this den and see no signs of ripping open the roots to make a cavity or digging in the ground. It appears that the tree itself made this cavity, and I would say intentionally, the relationship between the bears and the trees is symbiotic as well. The bears the salmon up from the creek bed, depositing their bones and their flesh on the mountain side, allowing the trees to have the ocean minerals that allow them to get this big and become the ancient beings that they are.
Above shows my brother Dale walking by one of those giant cedars that had a bear den right underneath it.
Below shows me leaning back kind of awkwardly, giving a bit of a size reference for the trunk of that cedar with a bear den underneath.
looking up the trunk of the ancient cedar with a bear den underneath
Below shows a pair of ancient giants on the steep granite mountainside holding together the mountain, nourishing the valley.
There were many moments when we were hiking down into into the core of and back out of that valley when I felt like there were presences around us that were not visible to my eyes and these presences, they felt ancient, they felt loving, and when I took a picture in some instances, some visuals showed up on my pictures. Here’s an example.
A fallen elder now becoming a nurse log for the next generation of beings to grow in the mountainside, creating a rich life-giving soil, nourishing both the ocean and future generations of giants.
Below shows me with another one of the magnificent ancient red cedars we witnessed on our ascent backup the mountainside heading towards the east ridge on the headwaters of Ferry Creek.
As we approached the last 500 feet or so of our climb up to the mountain top, these beautiful hemlock became very prominent in the scene, and this image here shows me looking down between two hemlock towards my mom there that is standing beside one of the few giant red cedars that was among them.
looking up through a grove of elder hemlock
This is what it looks like looking up the mountainside when you’re about 75 or 80% of the way up the ascent to the ridge on the east side of the headwaters
My brother Dale and mom trying to peer up towards the ridgeline, seeing how much further we have to go.
If you look closely in the image below you can see my mom perched way up on a stump above my brother scouting the best route ahead as we made the final ascent to the ridge.
The last stretch of that particular route we chose to climb up the mountain was steep.
If you look closely in the image below you can see the light shining through the trees in the center, that is the top of the mountain ridge.
The video below shows you a video clip of what the terrain looks like at that section of the mountain (about 200 feet down from the east ridge of the headwaters).
Video above was recorded at the place circled in blue below. Blue arrow shows our approximate path of ascent.
There were two more spectacular Hemlock that I crossed paths with near where the video above was recorded that I saved seeds from before my camera ran out of battery as we approached the ridge. Those will be the last pictures you see from our journey into this sacred valley:
Above, notice my mom in the lower right corner (so tiny compared to this mighty ancient hemlock, likely over 1400 years of age).
Below you can see this tree had a portal going right underneath and this tree has seen natural forest fires and survived.
This elder protector and sentry of the Fairy Creek valley was a wisdom keeper and rememberer of ancient secrets of the land.
I gathered cones full of seeds from the base of this mighty guardian of the valley so that no matter what happens I can ensure his deep memory is gifted onward to future generations through the continuation of his progeny.
Thank you for taking this epic journey with me and thank you for caring about rare ancient forest watersheds like Fairy Creek.
Please share this post to help raise awareness about the beauty, biodiversity and spiritual nourishment that sacred places like this provide and why we need to protect them for future generations.
Thank you for caring about our Mother Earth and the ancient rooted beings in the forest, please share this post far and wide so we can get the word out and protect what is left of our sacred heritage of ancient forest.
Subscribing and donating to this newsletter (via becoming a paid subscriber or using this one time donation link) helps me to be able to publish more posts like this to educate, empower and inspire people all over to become their best selves and life in service of life. I am grateful to all of you that support this sacred work.
In closing I will leave you with this story of the courage and integrity of one human being, making the difference in protecting an ancient tree.
December 10, 1997. Northern California.
Julia Butterfly Hill was 23 when she climbed Luna, a massive ancient redwood tree in Humboldt County, and set up a tiny platform nearly 180 feet above the ground. Her goal was simple: keep the Pacific Lumber Company from cutting it down. She expected to stay a few days. Nobody imagined she would remain in the tree for more than two years.
The old-growth redwood forests were disappearing, and Luna was one of the few giants left, believed to be between 600 and 1,500 years old. Logging crews had already marked it for cutting. Julia decided the only way to stop it was to live in the tree itself.
Life in the canopy was anything but romantic. She slept on small wooden platforms, hauled up supplies by rope, endured freezing rain and violent storms, and strapped herself to branches when high winds made the tree sway wildly. Helicopters flew close to rattle her, and loggers cut down surrounding trees to intimidate her. She faced isolation, exhaustion, and constant danger. Still, she stayed.
Through a solar-powered phone and later radio interviews, Julia began sharing Luna’s story with the world. She spoke about the damage caused by clear-cutting and the importance of protecting ancient ecosystems. Her quiet determination drew national attention, and the pressure on Pacific Lumber increased.
Day after day, season after season, she refused to come down. She celebrated two birthdays in Luna. She endured two winters. She learned the rhythms of the forest and felt a deep connection to the tree she was trying to save.
After 738 days, Pacific Lumber finally agreed to negotiate. On December 18, 1999, Julia climbed down from Luna. The company promised to protect the tree and the land around it in exchange for a donated payment from supporters. Luna was safe.
Her return to solid ground was difficult. After so long in a constantly swaying tree, she could barely walk without losing her balance. But she had won. One person had saved an ancient redwood that might otherwise have been lost forever.
Julia’s tree-sit became one of the most famous acts of environmental activism in modern history. It showed the power of nonviolent resistance and inspired people around the world to believe that individual action can create real change. Luna still stands today, protected and growing, even after surviving vandalism in 2000.
Julia Butterfly Hill gave up two years of her life for one tree. Many would call that sacrifice unreasonable. She saw it differently. She believed that change begins when someone decides not to give up, even when the odds are impossible.
One person. One tree. 738 days. And Luna is still alive because she chose to climb and refused to come down.
In August of 2025, with the help of generous donations from subscribers to my Substack newsletter, I journeyed across Canada, up gnarly logging roads and hiked into that valley (one of the last intact ancient forest ecosystems in Canada that exists on the scale of an entire watershed) to document the beauty, endangered species and sacred expressions of symbiosis in a series of photojournalism posts.
It is an ecosystem with trees that rival the redwoods in their size and biodiversity supporting roles) but that forest (Fairy Creek) and the neighboring valley (the Walbran valley) are now under threat due to corporate greed and government collusion.
We have less than 1% of the original coastal rainforests of the type we explored in the post above, intact today. As noted above, it took multiple millennia for that forest to become what it is today, and yet the government (and corporations) here want to tell you that we can clearcut these rare forest ecosystems “sustainably”.
While this place was once recognized as sacred and a place for spiritual connection to the Creator by the governing council of indigenous land stewards that have called southern Vancouver Island home for millennia, some of them how now been infected with the sickness of greed and the spiritual poverty of statism/”Wendigo thinking” and no longer wish to protect the valley for future generations as their ancestors did.
The Canadian government has only deferred clearcut logging of the Fairy Creek headwaters in a court order until September of 2026, if they choose to continue down the path of greed and exploitation and do not legally protect that valley permanently, we need to be ready to do what ever it takes to protect this sacred place for future generations.
The 7th generation that comes after us is calling to us now, asking us to stand up so that they can have access to the same spiritual wealth and beauty that we do now.
The first two posts from this series can be found below:
(This post serves as the 34th post which is part of the (Stacking Functions in the Garden, Food Forest and Medicine Cabinet : The Regenerative Way From Seed To Apothecary series).
For more info on the Forest Protectors of Fairy Creek that stood up to the corrupt government goons and exploitative corporations in 2021, read the post below
“Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nat…
Those suffering from the wendigo (sickness of greed) insanity (Teal Jones and their government accomplices) are attempting to target ancient rainforest for clearcutting and exporting as part of a racketeering operation that intends on stealing the heritage of our great great grandchildren.
Corrupt government and their corporate colluders are trying to sneak into the valley next to Fairy Creek and decimate the ancient forest pressed against the Fairy Creek headwaters ridge while everyone is distracted.
Please see link below for how you can demand they stop this insanity of attempting to pillage the last of our ancient rainforests.
TAKE ACTION — Submit your comment before February 22
Link to comment guide + example submission is linked below :
The video clip below is from back when our corrupt government and their corporate partners were trying to annihilate the ancient forest in Fairy Creek in 2021. They are trying to do the same now near the East ridge of Fairy Creek headwaters and in Walbran valley. We need to make sure that the world is watching again, otherwise these profiteers, psychopaths and their enforcers will destroy the last of the ancient forests and these forests will not be seen on the earth again for millennia.
Thank-you so much for making this article, as well as your other articles. Beautiful! I live in the Highlands on Vancouver Island, very much the same as the rain forest I lived near in Costa Rica (but cooler). I love living here! I invite you to read this book, "Green Blood Rising" by local author Lea Tassie. I will look for a copy, I had copies but I think I already gave them away. She gave me a few when she did an interview on our (now defunct) local community TV show. Here is the epigraph:
«There is a close similarity between chlorophyll and hemoglobin, the essence of our blood. So that you may lay your hand upon the smooth flank of a beech and say, "We be of one blood, brother, thou and I." The one significant difference in the two structural formulas is this: that the hub of every hemoglobin molecule is one atom of iron, while in chlorophyll it is one atom of magnesium.
All the children of the earth, the red-blooded and green-blooded equally, are descendant from some common origin, that may be as old as light, and, like light, is forever arriving. (From Flowering Earth, by Donald Culross Peattie)»
Absolutely breathtaking. I have no words but thank you for sharing. What a gift to have experienced that trip.
Thank-you so much for making this article, as well as your other articles. Beautiful! I live in the Highlands on Vancouver Island, very much the same as the rain forest I lived near in Costa Rica (but cooler). I love living here! I invite you to read this book, "Green Blood Rising" by local author Lea Tassie. I will look for a copy, I had copies but I think I already gave them away. She gave me a few when she did an interview on our (now defunct) local community TV show. Here is the epigraph:
«There is a close similarity between chlorophyll and hemoglobin, the essence of our blood. So that you may lay your hand upon the smooth flank of a beech and say, "We be of one blood, brother, thou and I." The one significant difference in the two structural formulas is this: that the hub of every hemoglobin molecule is one atom of iron, while in chlorophyll it is one atom of magnesium.
All the children of the earth, the red-blooded and green-blooded equally, are descendant from some common origin, that may be as old as light, and, like light, is forever arriving. (From Flowering Earth, by Donald Culross Peattie)»
https://archive.org/details/green-blood-rising/page/n4/mode/1up