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Tree Wisps
During the spring of 2008 a friend was driving us on the 101 northbound towards Van Nuys from the Universal City area.
Between passing the 134 and the Van Nuys Boulevard exit, we noticed the strangest thing that we could not explain, understand, and have never seen since.
To this day I wish I had gotten out at a nearby exit to investigate.
At the south side of the highway are numerous tall trees lining up, as it were, along side the highway walls.
This one day at the tip top of several of the tallest trees seemed to be little wisps.
Not on every single tree, but definitely on the taller ones.
The first one I saw I thought some small white plastic shopping bag had snagged there from a breeze, but then I saw another and a third, just as my friend began to notice them as well.
They clearly were not solid, nor did they seem to be vapour, and many seemed to be detached and just resting in mid-air inches from being actually connect to the tree! They were all sideways like little translucent flag banners, "pointing" westward.
They weren't being "blown" as all of them were stock still.
They each seemed to be maybe a foot wide at the tree, quickly tapering into a point, like a small triangular banner.
I suspect it was probably some sort of meteorological phenomenon, but I've no idea how to search for small vapourous mists "nearly" attached to the tops of trees on an otherwise clear day.
At the time, the most we could say was, "What the hell is that?" and/or "What is making them do that?"My friend who was driving conveys it this way:
"While you thought it was at first a bag floating, I thought it at first was smoke -- the first time I saw it, I thought that the tree had a small fire in it.
Also, I think it's important to note that the wisps were "attached" to the same type of tree each time.
Always a tree in what I think may be the conifer family -- like a tall, skinny pine tree of sorts.
I wonder if heat or something like that causes those types of trees to release a gas that is heavier than the local atmosphere and shows up when the light hits it or something like that?
Hmmmm..... that is still one of the weirdest, most interesting things I've ever seen."
To this day not only have we no explanation, but we have never seen this phenomenon since
(and believe me, every time we drive that section of highway, we glance to the southside trees)...
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