1. Fir Waves and Your Daily Puzzler presented by Peter White

2. Fir Waves in Japan on Mt Shimigare Doug Sprugel (U Washington) did his PhD on fir waves in New Hampshire…here he is on his first visit to fir waves in Japan

3. After the conference we went to an alpine lodge along a wonderful high mountain trail and drank lots of Saki on Mt. Shimigare (named for the fir waves that appear in landscape paintings from hundreds of years ago). I drew this picture of Doug Sprugel pointing at a fir wave in Japan and it hangs on the wall there! I am a famous artist! If you ever hike the Japanese Alps, look for this picture. The Japanese Prince had stopped by and so my picture was next to his. You may recognize the American signees, Doug Sprugel and Craig Lorimer. One of the Japanese signees is Shin-Ichi Yamamoto, a disturbance ecologist who co- organized the symposium with me.

4. What is a Fir Wave? Fir Waves occur in pure fir forests, on long continuous slopes and where the wind is from a constant direction (upslope, owing to the topography). Here, the trees on the upper side of the wave are hit by the wind and die as a stripe, young fir at the lower end of the stripe are growing in the lee of the trees next to them and eventually become adult trees. Thus, the wave of mortality proceeds upslope at a rate of about 2- 3 m per year. Fir Waves occur in New York and New England and in Japan. Google fir waves and shimigare and you will find the citable literature.

5. Your Puzzler for the Day: Who was Frank Egler? Why did he challenge ecologists to prove that relay floristics and facilitation occurred during old field succession in New England? He offered a $10,000 reward…did anyone claim in? He is deceased (I think!), but if the reward was still out there would you be able to claim it? Why is this relevant to Chapter 3?