Cloudscraper Trees

Cloudscraper trees are not a unique species of tree, but a designation given to trees that rise beyond the ambient level of the crown in the Green Maw to enter the emergent zone. These trees are uncommon but not rare. From the top of one you can likely see several others. Individual cloudscrapers often form "island" ecosystems with unique species in that area. Halflings have different theories about how they come about, be it special minerals in the soil or a confluence of leylines or something else. Some of them also believe that these trees are progenitor Dreamers of the Maw, either by creating them directly or evolving into them.

Characteristics of all Cloudscraper Trees:

Flora

• Giant burls the size of a halfling (may be manipulated by halflings)
• Pry Vines (break apart steelwood, speeding the shedding process. Responds to lightning, has become a halfling construction tool)
• Carnivorous Cloud Moss
• Flower with a wind-born seed, flower part as large as a halfing head
• Little Pine, its a regular tree (???)

Fauna

• Tree-dwelling eels, flat and ribbon-like, live in stagnant water in tree bowls and in liquid sap
• Best Friend. Peregrine falcon like birds, can be ridden, hunt other birds of prey. Some groves specialize in raising them, very rare but powerful.
• Spring Termites
• Feathered Colossus, a massive bird that migrates between cloudscrapers, plankton-esk feeding
• migratory sap crabs. Spawn young in sap, prey for the eels. They are little enough that blowing sticky bubbles and catching the wind works.

Hazards/Features

• Sinkholes
• wind-shorn face of the 'scraper, where little lives
• Sap Traps
• Tree Disease
• Constant wet

Known Cloudscraper Trees:

• Cloud City: Center of Bristlecone Alliance.