Hey, those trees that Kate and Juliet hid out in, to avoid Smoky, looked just like the trees that Walt used to keep away from the polar bear back in season one. Shot at the same location, I'm guessing? Night instead of day, so we wouldn't readily recognize it?

I think theyve occaisonally used locations more than once, but at different angles and times of day. Theyve only got so much space in Hawaii where they can shoot with no real signs of civilization. Kate also hid inone of these trees in the pilot and Boone and Shannon hid in one in "Hearts and Minds."

Yeah I doubt it was supposed to be the same trees. They are too far away from the camp.

Is there a specific species of trees in the tropics that grows like that? Forming sort of an enclosed cage which one can climb into the center of?

I have hiked around Hawaii a lot, and I have to say that seeing a bunch of trees of the same species growing in a dense pattern like that is a fairly common sight. They're all over the place.

Same tree as Walt v Polar Bear.

Same tree Jack and Kate hid in before!

Same tree.

Are you sure - they aren't near that part of the island are they ?

Its the same TYPE of tree.
Not the exact same tree

And Shannon and Boone in Boone's dream.

I always assumed they were Banyan Trees. Aren't they symbolic to Buddhists?

It's also the same kinda tree that Kate hid in during the pilot ... as captured by McFarlane Toys in her action figure.

I always assumed they were Banyan Trees. Aren't they symbolic to Buddhists?

I don't think they're Banyans. Here is a photo of what Banyan (http://www.optimistisch.de/fotogalerie/06australien/43-37-BanyanTree.jpg) looks like. Compare that to some of the other screencaps I've included below.

Back in Season One when we were first shown these trees, I had first assumed they were Bamboo, since that is sort of how Bamboo grows - all bunched up like that... But then I realized once I had a good look at them that they were not Bamboo, since they have tree-like bark and all, which Bamboo doesn't have. Here's (http://gallery.lost-media.com/displayimage.php?pid=39367&fullsize=1) a shot of Bamboo, as well as a gratis photo of Sawyer without his shirt on for the ladies...

One kind of tree that is found all over Hawaii, and that grows in bunches like that, is Coffee, which is considered a weed tree by many people in Hawaii. But Coffee doesn't usually grow as tall as these trees seemed to.

There are so many different varieties of trees growing in Hawaii, that it would be really difficult just from looking at them through screencaps to determine what type of tree they are. I spent some time working in the Forest Service before I moved to Hawaii, and I make a big effort to try to know what kind of trees I encounter in the wild - it's just in my nature. But in Hawaii there were just so many unfamiliar tree species that it was impossible to learn them all during the two years I was there.

When I lived in Hawaii I used to camp out a lot, and people told me all the time not to burn trees in campfires unless I absolutely positively knew what they were. The reason for that is because there are some species of trees there that emit poisonous fumes when burning, and have been known to seriously hurt or even kill people who have been around their smoke. This made it difficult to find firewood, since any tree that has been dead long enough to be nice and dry and well-suited for burning in a fire tends to become unidentifiable in the process. Coffee trees were okay to burn, though, and since that species is literally everywhere, it was sort of my stand-by for using for firewood, since it was fairly easy to identify, and due to the fact that it grows in bunches, there would be dead trees still more or less standing next to their relatives.

I can say though that from what I have seen from the episodes where people are hiding in these thickets, that they do not look like they were filmed using the same spot. The thickets of trees look different. They might even be the same species, but they don't look like the same place. One of the problems with tree identification in Hawaii is that there are lots of species of parasitical plants that grow up along the outside bark of other established trees, making it very difficult to see what the host tree looks like sometimes.

Here are some screencaps of the trees:

1. (http://gallery.lost-media.com/displayimage.php?pid=14264&fullsize=1) This is from 01x01, "The Pilot", when Kate hides in the trees right after the pilot gets nabbed from the cockpit. I couldn't get any better screenshot of the trees than this, and it really doesn't show much other than the trees are not Bamboo.

2. (http://gallery.lost-media.com/displayimage.php?pid=24600&fullsize=1) This shot is from 01x13 "Hearts and Minds" when Boone rescues Shannon during his hallucination. These trees are to me quite obviously NOT the same. Lostpedia (http://lostpedia.com/wiki/Hearts_and_Minds) says that they were hiding in a Mangrove trunk, but I'm not sure whether that is accurate or not. And Mangrove is sort of a generic term for any tree growing in a swamp, not a specific species.

3. (http://gallery.lost-media.com/displayimage.php?pid=27368&fullsize=1) and here (http://gallery.lost-media.com/displayimage.php?pid=27361&fullsize=1). Episode 01x14 "Special". This is when Walt gets attacked by a polar bear and hides in a thicket of trees. Locke and Michael come and rescue him and chase the bear off. These trees are very different looking than some of the others we've seen. In fact, there appears to be more than one species, judging from the appearance of their bark...

4. (http://gallery.lost-media.com/displayimage.php?pid=39624&fullsize=1) and here (http://gallery.lost-media.com/displayimage.php?pid=39635&fullsize=1). In 01x23 "Exodus part 1", there's another incident when Jack, Arzt, Hurley, Kate, Locke and Danielle have to hide from Smokie in a thicket. These trees are so covered with parasitical vines that it is impossible to tell from looking at their bark what kind of tree they are.

Anyway, although these are all from just Season One, I think they show that there is more than one thicket, or bunch, of trees that the production crew is using for filming. However, I might be wrong about that... :drowsy:

I still can't understand why Smokie can't uproot those particular trees...

I still can't understand why Smokie can't uproot those particular trees...

I don't really think that they are any particular one species. From the screencaps they appear to be at least several different kinds of tree. I'm not sure why Smokie can't uproot them either, but I don't think it's due to what type of trees they are...