The Daintree Rainforest

How about the size of this fern? We thought Cinnamon ferns in Appalachia were impressive!

Palm

Strangler fig doing its thing to another tree.

Like big ferns and palms? This is the place for you.

Looking up at the canopy

And this is what you see!

Leafy vine

Birding is really hard here, but bird diversity is supposed to be incredible.

I thought these palms were the coolest

Buttress roots were common.

Two world heritage sites (I believe there are only 34 in the entire world) sit nearly on top of each other in this little corner of Australia - the Great Barrier Reef (which, truth be told, goes way beyond this little corner of Australia!) and the Daintree rainforest. Why is the Daintree special? Two words: Relictual biodiversity. Huh? OK, most tropical rainforests are diverse, but this one has been around a LONG time, and thus contains relicts of evolution that other places on earth lack. One example, now quite well known, is Idiospermum australiense (idiot fruit!). This endemic tree has been around for 120 million years! That's a long time. The seedlings have 3 or 4 cotyledons (most plants have one or 2, an evolutionary path chosen long ago by most flowering plants). Crazy huh?

The Daintree looks like a scene from Jurassic Park - huge tree ferns, vines, etc. are everywhere. All of this is wonderfully described at the Daintree Discovery Centre, where you can walk right up in the canopy with an elevated walkway and a tower at the end. The audio guide and written guides are both excellent for introducing the animal and plant life unique to the area.