aging

Close up of redwood bark with a copper-green patina of lichen

Die Like a Tree

On a recent trip to Sunset Beach, I came across an old tree with thinning branches, draped with copper-green lace lichen. A few of the branches were broken, splintered on the ground, dotted with holes bored by insects. The lichen doesn’t harm the tree’s living branches, but the dead branches give the lichen a place…