New critically endangered tree species depends on unique habitat found only on Kaua'i

Date: August 16, 2017

Source: Pensoft Publishers

Summary:

A new tree species, endemic to the floristically rich high Hawaiian island Kaua'i, is already assessed as Critically Endangered according to IUCN criteria. First collected and documented as early as 1988, the new species, Melicope stonei, has been officially described and named in a new article.

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Helen Puz Finds Bicycle She Lost Over 50 Years Ago Swallowed By Tree (VIDEO)

Charlie Brown had his kite-eating tree, but Helen Puz had an even more evil nemesis: A tree that swallowed her bike.

Even worse: She didn't realize what happened for more than 50 years.

Puz, now 99, received the bike in 1954 as a gift from a member of her community in Vashon Island, Wash., in part, because she had been recently widowed.

“People were very sympathetic and generous,” Puz said, according to ABC News. “We were given a girl’s bike and my 8-year-old son Don seemed the natural one to ride it.”

But little Don felt riding a girl's bike cramped his style so he, in the way little boys do, conveniently "lost" the bike.

Or so the Puz family thought, until recently when Helen Puz read in the local newspaper about a bike that had been "swallowed up" in a tree and was now stuck in the trunk five feet off the ground, according to Discover Washington State.

Don and Helen Puz visited the tree -- located 50 feet off of the Vashon Highway -- and confirmed the bike was indeed the one that Don lost many years ago, Geobeats reported.

Video:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/03/helen-puz-finds-bicycle-swallowed-by-tree_n_2403380.html?utm_hp_ref=weird-news