Carolina Environmental Diversity Explorations
Roan Mountain Highlands · By Dirk Frankenberg and Jennifer Godwin-Wyer
Grassy bald with spruce and rhododendron
Figure 8. Why this grassy bald exists next to thriving trees is a mystery. (Photograph by Dirk Frankenberg. More about the photograph)
Figure 8 shows the grassy bald at the crest of the Roan with spruce-fir forest and rhododendron. Figure 8 also signals a change in this fieldtrip’s focus from geology to ecology. The grassy bald mystery deepens with views like the one shown here. The bald is free of trees on the right, but specimens of all three forest types are seen in the bald on the left and in the background. On the left the wooded patch contains rhododendron, spruce, and northern hardwood trees. Why they grow on the left and not on the right is the mystery.
