The South End of Kodiak is a very different place from the North End where the city of Kodiak is situated. Near town on the North End there are rain forests of Sitka Spruce with an understory of alder, devil's club and blueberry. There are no forests down on the south half of Kodiak - just grassland and coastal tundra. This part of the island is more like the Aleutians while the north end is more like Southeast Alaska. Needless to say, but the south end has some great hiking!
Kodiak actually has two treelines - one is the edge of the spruce forest as it colonizes its way south while the other is marked by how up the mountains the trees can grow. Both treelines are on the move. Earlier in the 20th century the City of Kodiak lacked spruce trees - it is only in the last 100 years that the area has become forested - and it appears that prior to around 800 years ago there were no trees on Afognak (the big island north of Kodiak). Biologists have even figured out the rate in terms of miles per decade that the forest moves. The alpine treeline is also on the move, probably due to global warming. Old USGS maps from the 1950 show the forests extending much less far up the mountains than they do now. And I have even noticed that the alder and low growing bushes extend further up the mountains today than they did when i moved here 10 years ago.
But neither treeline has made it to the south end. Just glorious tundra down there. One wonders what it will look like in 200 years. Will the trees ever make it that far south?
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