Southeast Alaska Rainforest

The Southeast Alaska Temperate Rainforest

With rainfalls commonly reaching 150 inches a year, Southeast Alaska is a wet place indeed. An amazing plant community thrives in this temperate rainforest. The photos above left, above, and left, are from The Brothers Islands, where thick sphagnum moss gives the sense of walking on a mattress.

At Mole Harbor, Admiralty Island, a developed trail leads to Alexander Lake. Small miracles flank the trail, such as skunk cabbage during a rain (above,left), life renewing itself in a dead stump, (left) green, green ferns, and lower left, deep, cushiony sphagnum moss.

At Scenery Cove in Thomas Bay north of Petersburg, more tiny treasures abound. Upper right: Moss drapes a tree; right: Indian paintbrush comes in many hues and forms in Alaska, here occurring in an unusual branched pattern; below: the perfect blueberry, a common shrub throughout the North; below right: bees make the most of a large shoreside flower.