A Community Of Colonies

Day 74: Living side-by-side, colonies of half a dozen different moss and lichen species share a mere twelve inches of branch, a precarious equilibrium which does not kill the parent tree. Some take nourishment from the tree itself, feeding on natural chemicals drawn from decaying matter in the soil while others rely on nutrients carried down to them by rain.

One has to wonder if Nature is delivering a metaphor here. Admittedly, at some point, one colony will dominate the branch, but this occurs through an ecological attrition. When one population falls, another expands into the vacated territory. For now, however, lichen is content to exist beside moss and vice versa, maintaining not only balance, but doing so with exceptional elegance and beauty.