Northern Central Rockies Forests - Holiday Special 2020

On the far eastern edge of the Northwest, conifers encounter the region's most extreme conditions: biting cold and deep snow on the high peaks, enormous forest fires in the dry lowlands. Conifers are a group of plants with many fascinating evolutionary stories, and the ways in which their structure and physiology have adapted to ice and to fire shows is perhaps the most impressive of these biological sagas. In this episode, we travel to some of the best-known and best-loved national parks on both sides of the US-Canada border to explore how two species of conifer in particular cope with environmental extremes.