New banyon/strangler fig tree

I was lucky enough to spend most of the month of November with my family on the big island of Hawaii. While I was there I did what I always do when I am out, took photos and notes of trees and plants I wanted to sculpt. On the last week of my trip I left my family and went to the east side of Hawaii which is much wetter and has a lot of rainforest. There is even a zoo and botanical garden (Pana' ewa Rainforest Zoo and Botanical Gardens) that is the only zoo in the USA (maybe even the world but I can't remember if that is true or not) that is entirely inside a native rainforest. Anyway, one of the things I saw while driving around Hilo was lots of banyon and strangler fig trees. Here are a couple of photos that inspired me to make my latest model.
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There were also many types of palms and Philadendrons growing around the city, here is one of my favorites, a split leaf Philadendron and a lady palm.
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I worked on this since I came home, it has been 16 days from start to now, I still have a small amount of touch up work and I want to add some more foliage to the banyon so I can thicken up some of the canopy but it is pretty much ready to go on the diorama as it. The color of the bark is brown not red, I don't know how to use this camera and I am having trouble taking photos above the water, it is set for underwater pictures and I don't know how to adjust the color compensation yet, someday I'll figure it out.
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I'll get a few more photos when I put it out on the diorama.

Absolutly phantastic!!

This is amazing tree! Thank You for sharing photos Phil!!

Wonderful Phil, you are so talented, Hawaii must of have been fun.

The pictures you took in Hawaii are lovely, what beautiful trees - your tree is fantastic I just love the vines hanging down off it they look so real

Wonderful Phil, I lke the way you melted the plants and trees all together

:) :)

Very good work Phil.

Animals and trees,perfect combination in your hobby.

It is always exciting see your talent and dedication to such an interesting matter! :) Please keep enjoying us with your works and I'm eager to see it finished!

beautiful! your talent is amazing!

Speechless!! You are doing more complicated sculpting than before. Thanks for showing!

Wonderful pictures and amazing models

Ohh, it must have been wonderful to be almost a month in Hawai, I wished it was me !
Was it awfully hot there ?
Are the beaches a gorgeous as they look on photoes ?
What kind of wildlife lives there ?

Ups, sorry for all the ( stupid) questions

SUSANNE wrote:

Wonderful pictures and amazing models

Ohh, it must have been wonderful to be almost a month in Hawai, I wished it was me !
Was it awfully hot there ?
Are the beaches a gorgeous as they look on photoes ?
What kind of wildlife lives there ?

Ups, sorry for all the ( stupid) questions

No such thing as a stupid question, and I was going to show some more photos anyway. I go to Hawaii every year and I love it there, the temps are dependent on the season and where you are on the islands. The Hawaiian Islands are a chain of about 100 islands, but only 8 have enough space and water for people to live so for most people when you say Hawaii they think of these main islands. I was on the big island (actually named Hawaii) this whole trip. On the Kona side (west) it was very dry, that is typical of all of the islands, as the trade winds bring moisture to the chain it rains a lot on the north/eastern side but after the clouds go over the mountains, there is very little moisture left so the western/southern areas are dry. The temps while we were there were in the 80's with very high humidity. It is the wet season so it was also cloudy and it rained for a little while every afternoon, but the rain isn't like most places, you don't even try to get out of it because it is refreshing and helps cool you off.

Here is two photos, the first is the Kona (dry) side, the second is the Hilo (wet) side.
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Susanne, while there are beautiful sandy beaches like in the photos, especially on Oahu near Waikiki (which means jumping water in Hawaiian) where we were the beaches look like this.
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These are just 3 of the beaches, but they are typical of the big island. There is some sandy beaches, there is also a green sand beach. The green comes from a gemstone called olivine, and the walls of the shore are lined with it. As the waves break and crush the olivine up it makes the beach material.

Finally here are just some of the photos of wildlife, I have hundreds of photos of plants which I will post in the "Talk About What You Want" forum but these are some of the animals we saw. The only native mammal is a bat, but mongoose have taken over and are feeding on the native birds causing them to decline in numbers. There are also wild goats on the island, they are very shy because people hunt them for food but I got some good photos one day while driving down the coast along the main highway. Just like the above statement, I don't know how to use this camera yet so I am sorry for the photo quality.
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There were also lots and lots of small gecko's and anolis, here is a gold dust gecko and a green anole.
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Here is a series of bird photos, again the camera and I need to have a serious talk, but I did get a few photos.

Saffron finch
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Red jungle fowl in the wild
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Endangered Hawaiian stilt
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Also endangered in the upper left a pair of Hawaiian coots
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The Hawaiian owl, which is a day active owl because when they were evolving there were no rodents on the islands so it learned to hunt birds which it does during daylight hours
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Yellow beaked cardinal, which is not a native but came with people as caged pet birds and escaped.
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I also went up to the cauldron of the volcano on the island, this particular day there was no flowing lava, but a few days later it started but was so slow that is was melting the surface rock and I couldn't get out onto it for some good photos. I did get to the edge and as soon as I go through and sort the photos I'll post more photos.
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Wow! I look forward to seeing all your other photos in the Talk about all you want - Section. These are great!

I have never been to Hawaii. I love taking a trip through your photos Phil. Thank you.


~ Sue

Phil thanks for posting those photos, they are amazing! The Volcano is incredible.