The Strangling Fig John and I hiked up the mountain which is called Pic N'Gau today and on the way we walked down the lane which is called Kou Bugny meaning beneath the Bugny trees because it is so wonderfully and tightly thatched overhead by two long rows of ancient Bugny trees' branches. Mesmerized by the majesty of those trees I strolled along starry eyed and mouth agape until one particular tree elicited from me an involuntary gasp. The tree was striking because it was ghostly grey in a wood otherwise composed of dark rough trunks. It was also splendidly huge and luxuriously smooth, gracefully twisting and reaching high as though just waking from a long nap and having a good slow yawn and stretch. It exuded strength and health and a vibrant life force. In awe I approached this regal being whose roots stood narrow and tall two feet above the ground at the trunk and extending more than fifteen feet radially at the base. In fact the roots themselves were so massive as to feel more like molten earth twisted up into meringue peaks which only above midway had sprouted and leafed to produce the broad canopy. In that moment I fell completely in love with that tree and I photographed her hoping to capture that impossible grandeur. Perhaps this rapture which I enjoyed is the reason I felt suddenly and violently shocked as camera in hand I rounded to the far side of the tree and found within that tree, like a hotdog wrapped in a bun, was another trunk --dark and rough of grand diameter in its own right, an ancient Bugny now quite dead. A dark branch pierced the even grey engulfing trunk reaching skyward in a desperate but unheeded cry for help clawing for light and air to no avail. It is difficult not to judge the strangling fig whose seed must land on the bark of another tree to sprout and begin life. It then extends a root blindly following along its host's trunk down to the ground while a sprout begins its path upward also groping its way along that supporting trunk to the light. For years the strangling fig continues its tenuous existence perched upon its host but over time it wraps its tendrils all the way around and as though clasping its hands in an irrevocable closure the tendrils fuse together completing the trap. Now as the tendrils grow they start to squeeze the tree beneath. Trees are interesting because they are inside out from humans. All the life of a tree is on the outside just beneath the protective bark. You may have seen giant trees which have endured fires or lightning and are completely hollow in the middle yet continue to thrive and grow even tolerating an entire house within their heart. It's easy though to kill a tree though simply by girdling it and island farms are often surrounded by tall dead trees who instead of being felled have been slashed with a machete all the way around just deep enough to stop the flow of life so the leaves will not shade the field. And so the strangling fig effectively girdles its host by squeezing it tight all the way around in a death lock. Often eventually one can no longer even discern the tree beneath which originally hosted this exuberant all consuming hitchhiker. But the strangling fig has no choice. It only does what it is made to do. It cannot walk away to find another place to grow. It need not debate the ethics of its lifestyle. A tree is not even faced with the decision to be or not to be. It doesn't ask itself if it has the right to survive at the expense of another. It doesn't try to share the space or the resources. It just does what it does and it does it well�... Humans on the other hand have a choice.