Forests That Make You Wonder What Planet You’re On
Is there life on another planet? I don’t know, nobody knows. Sure the smart guys over at NASA think they’ve found some cool stuff on Mars…but the jury’s still out.
What is way more fun is to look at awesome forests on our Planet and realize that we totally have alien looking stuff all over – you just have to see the forest for the trees.
Table of Contents
20. Dragons Blood Forest, Socotra Island
Ever heard of Socotra Island? Yeah, didn’t think so. It’s known as the most alien looking place in the world. It’s actually an archipelago (group of 4 islands) in the Indian Ocean. Over 700 species were found on the islands that were not known anywhere else on the Earth. The Dragon’s Blood Trees, Cucumber Trees, and Desert Rose Tree’s are unlike any tree’s in the world. Plants on this island just didn’t get the memo on how they are supposed to look.
19. Doll’s Eye
This deadly poisonous plants will lead to an extremely painful and immediate death if ingested, but the berries (eye balls) are harmless to birds. Primarily growing in the eastern US States the Doll’s eye has a very eerie look to it. Like the Lithops, it seems like a alien cloning experiment gone terribly wrong.
18. Rainbow Eucalyptus Forest, Maui
Ever wonder why Hawaii is known for beautiful colors and gorgeous landscapes? Maybe because even their trees are better than regular trees. No regular ugly old bark on the Rainbow Eucalyptus – oh no, these trees go through a rainbow transformation throughout their long life changing colors from bright green, purple, maroon, blue, orange tones, and then finally regular brown. It’s a breath taking tree.
17. Crooked Forest Poland
These tress were planted in the 1930’s in Gryfino, Poland. That’s pretty much the extent of our knowledge on them. Why are they misshaped and crooked? No one knows. It’s fun to speculate though. Some guess they were purposely shaped this way for shipbuilding purposes. Others theorize that a WWII tank ran over the trees when they were young and permanently broke and shaped them, but didn’t kill them.
16. Avenue of the Baobabs, Madagascar
When I think of Madagascar I think of desolate desert, sweltering heat, and just miserably ugly existence. The Baobabs tree’s are there to prove me wrong. It’s estimated the the gigantic trees are over 800 years old and that one tree can store up to 31,700 gallons of water! The beautiful foliage and huge size give an indication of the lush and beautiful forest that once spread across Madagascar.
15. Sunken Forest, Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan normally more known for its conflict with Russia and America is home to a beautiful underwater forest. The crazy sight at Lake Kaindy is due to an earthquake in 1911. This huge quake caused a landslide which created a natural dam. The spruce trees that existed in the valley remained with their dried tops standing above the water and their perfectly preserved lower trunk below the water’s surface. Eerie indeed.
14. Lithops, South Africa
If that doesn’t look like a human brain, I don’t know what does. Believe it or not this is a succulent plant that grows in Southern Africa. Evidently the aliens that may or may not have planted it realized that it would have a better chance of survival if it took on the shape of a rock. Sometimes these rock get confused and try and blend in with human brains, instead. Looks like the intelligent life forms made a few mistakes when programming them.
13. The Crooked Bush, Saskatchewan
Every thing is better in Canada, eh? Wait…no that’s not the expression – I think it’s “Blame Canada!” Yeah, that’s the one. Well, if we’re talking about an alien invasion that came in and turned trees into a bunch of living creatures all trying to catch one another, then ya – you can blame Canada for that one. The Crooked Bush forest in Saskatchewan, Canada is a national treasure and no one quite knows how or why the trees all grow the way they do.
12. Yili Apricot Valley, China
Beautiful? Check. Purposeful? Yup. Eerily like a scene from Avatar? Yesiree. Every year the Yili Apricot Valley in Xinjiang, China burst forth with the other wordly pink and white flowers. This signifies the coming of the apricot fruiting season. One can’t help but look at the photos and imagine little blue guys hiding in the trees.
11. Jabuticaba Forest, Brazil
Uh oh…what’s that covering the tree…some crazy South American ant beetle thing? Is it puss pockets? Nope, it’s delicious fruit reminiscent of a grape. The Jabuticaba grows berries all along its trunk. The white and purple fruit is harvested to be eaten, pressed into juice, or cooked into jam. Talk about low hanging fruit.
10. The Drunken Forest, Baltic Sea
The Curonian Spit is home to a beautiful Drunken or Dancing forest – depending on who you ask. There’s no scientific reason for the trees to be growing in waves and circles as they do. Most scientists conclude it has to do with the strong winds from the sea that shape them over time. The Vikings I’m sure had a more interesting idea about them.
9. Wollemi Forest, New South Wells
plantsinaction.science.uq.edu.au
At first glance the trees definitely look out of place. But, nothing like the Rainbow Eucalyptis or Dragon’s Blood. That is until you learn that these Wollemi Pine only grow here…and were thought to be extinct for a loooong time.
8. Corpse Flower, Indonesia
This alien looking plant gets its name due to the terribly, decaying flesh smell it gives off. It rarely blooms, but when it does the flower looks like thousands of bloody eyeballs staring at you. The terrible smell is a defensive mechanism to protect it against pray. The thousands of eyeballs – that could possibly be alien corn on the cob?
7. Deadvlei Forest, Namibia
A small African country just North and West of South Africa is known for its sparse population and rich diamond, gold, and silver mines. But, the Nambia Desert has something else beautiful to share. The Deadvlei tree. Sprouting 900 years ago after a very heavy rain, the tree had just enough water to grow, but then once all water and nutrients were dried up it quickly died. However, because the desert is so dry the trees were unable to decay – instead the sun has just burned and baked them black over the centuries.
With the mixture of black trees and blood orange sand mountains, it remains me exactly of the worlds in Dune.
6. Monkey Puzzle Forest, Chile
This endangered tree looks like some aliens came down and cross bred a pineapple and palm tree. It’s actually a living fossil and has been cultivated many years for its wood and edible seeds. It’s a native tree in Chile and gives the mountain side a futuristic look.
5. The Great Banyan, India
This 4 acre forest in India made up of over 3,300 is actually 1 tree that continues to grow and spread its roots and branches. The 250 year old Banyan tree has spread over 4 acres of land even after its main trunk was destroyed in 1925. Again, all of those “trees” in the picture are really just one tree. Talk about an alien plant invasion!
4. Hydnora Africana, Namibia
Oh the Hydnora Africana…it looks a bit like a flesh eating alien dinosaur, no? It may be busting through the desert floor or your friends chest, either way it will terrify you. Fortunately for this carnivorous plant, terrifying is its purpose. The Namibian desert claims this resident proudly. Weirder then its looks is how it pollinates. It reeks of dung. Which attracts dung beetles. The unsuspecting beetles crawl into its mouth, only to be trapped. But, instead of eating them like a empathetic killer plant would – instead the Hydnora just keeps them trapped until the beetle loses it’s bodily fluids which pollinates the flower. Once the beetle has lost all fluid, the Hydnora releases it – traumatized I’m sure.
3. Son Doong Forest, Vietnam
Is there such a thing as a new forest? Well, if there is Son Doong would win that honor. No one knew it existed until 2009. Why? Because it is entirely underground! That’s right, you have to rappel down into the largest cave in the world to get to it. How do the plants grow without ready exposure to light? Who knows. The better question is…what else is growing down there that we don’t know about?
2. Aokigahara Forest, Japan
A better name for this Japanese forest is Forest of Despair. Why? Well, evidently it is such a miserably sad place no wildlife live in the forest. That makes it perfectly serene and eerily quiet. That is, until someone commits Seppuku. That’s right…this forest is home to at least 50-150 suicides every single year. Some of the bodies are cleared out, but many remains of the dead are left to rot in their place. Creepy indeed.
1. Cedar Apple Rust Fungus, Everywhere
This could very well be the initial alien invasion. Technically not a plant or tree, but instead a plant pathogen. What does that mean? Well, basically anywhere where tree’s grow the Cedar Apple fungus attacks the apple…and turns it into an alien looking parasite. Think zombie control, or Alien host syndrome, but with apples. The process is relatively slow – but by the end of you can’t even tell that it use to be an apple and instead it looks like foreign space fruit.
There you have it – have we been visited by aliens? If not, we certainly have some rare and other-wordly looking forests, trees, and plants.
