The top of a redwood is a desert

Water reaches the top of a giant redwood by being pulled, and after a hundred metres of pulling there is not much left.

The leaves up there live permanently short of water. They grow shorter, thicker and tougher than the leaves on the same tree fifty metres below—built like desert plants, because functionally that is where they live.

One tree, in two climates at once.

How would you feel if your head lived in a different place than your feet?

Sources

• The limits to tree height — Koch et al. 2004, Nature

Sources checked 2026-08-12.