Luke, I Am Your Father: Moon Tree 2G

Sadly, it is fact that there are no trees on the Moon. Especially not large Fir Trees.

Well, at least this is what I'm led to believe by all the evidence that currently exists.  But who REALLY knows there aren't any?  Have we taken pictures of every inch of the Moon's surface?  I actually don't know the answer to this, but I am guessing that it's a big fat NO.

We landed men at the Sea of Tranquility over 40 years ago and there certainly weren't any there (that is, if we actually landed there and the whole thing wasn't just mocked up at an L.A. sound studio  - Capricorn One ring any bells OJ fans?).   I mean, for all we really know there could be an old growth forest, complete with spectacular and unimaginable creatures with very large feet and brown hair covering their entire body sitting just over some unexplored ridge. Yes, I am saying there may be Wookies on the Moon.

Okay, so there is a pretty high probability that there are no trees on the Moon. I'll concede that.

But when Mrs. LIAYF and I  heard this cool story about a Moon Tree at the State Capitol in Olympia on our local NPR station a couple weeks back we knew that we needed to take Lukas to see it.  And as we passed through there this past weekend Mrs. LIAYF suggested it was a good time to do just that.

Not the surface of the Moon.

As the story indicates, the 40 ft tall Douglas Fir is a Moon Tree because as a seedling it traveled on Apollo 14 to the Lunar Orbit back in 1971 and circled Earth's satellite 34 times!  It's also interesting to note that, barring a return trip to the Moon in the near future, once all of the current living Lunar astronauts have passed away, the Moon trees will be the only living things left that have visited the Moon.

That's pretty cool.

After a quick iPhone Google search helped us locate the tree we parked our car that sunny afternoon and made our way across a large lawn and up to the well traveled Douglas Fir and explained to Lukas, who is pretty crazy about space, and planets, and rockets just what it was he was seeing.  He was duly impressed.

On the surface it seemed like an ordinary tree, but knowing where it had been, it was quite the majestic sight.

Then, Mrs. LIAYF came up with another great idea as she suggested we collect a souvenir.  Not just any souvenir mind you but one which, if we treated it just right, might actually yield us a 2nd generation Moon Tree of our very own.

He's thinking of throwing this at something.

With that we collected a few of the prized Fir cones.  We're not sure yet where we will plant any seedlings that they may produce, but we do know a couple of things.  One, that Lukas is very excited about the prospect - who knows, perhaps he will one day take some of it's seeds to Mars.

And two that it where ever it grows, this certainly won't be just another tree.