 Today finds me at Timberline. The Germans call this zone the krummholtz. It means twisted wood. The trees in the krummholtz zone are contorted and stunted in form. Often they lack branches and foliage on the upwind side and have weirdly shaped branches on the downwind side. This flagging phenomena occurs at the krummholtz zone the world over. This distorted growth is due to the extreme wind and cold that prevails at Timberline for much of the year. The numbing cold can stop basic processes like photosynthesis for long periods. The winds are not just extremely cold. They also dry out any exposed buds and needles and bombard them with high velocity pellets of ice and snow. The most exposed parts of trees are often stripped of living tissues, needles and buds and even bark. Once you understand the effect of the cold ice-blasting wind you start to understand why conifers and other woody plants are usually found downwind from protection or they're covered and insulated by snow drifts. Often when one hardy tree is established it provides a sheltered microclimate and a seed source for others of its kind. This old flag tree breaks the wind and causes a snow bank where younger smaller trees survive. From the beautiful, fascinating and windy zone of the twisted wood, I'm Eric Peterson from the University of Wyoming Cooperative Extension Service.