What would cause a tree to do this?

@DeWayfarer That could be it. But I was right here in my house when it happened and I heard nothing. And that tree is not that far from my house.

@SW-User Had it happen to one of our Manzanita trees but it's not more than a hundred feet away so I definitely heard it.

@DeWayfarer Lighting strikes are loud. I wonder if I slept through it? lol I hate losing one of my trees. That thing is huge at the base too.

@SW-User It's possible. I have slept through them.

So was that Manzanita tree. Surprisingly it actually survived.

@DeWayfarer How did it survive? Was there not much damage?

@SW-User Manzanita grow wide (around 50 feet around) and only about 35 feet tall with five or six branches starting one two feet of the ground.

One of those branches caught the lighting strike good so that one branch split and bent. the other 5 branches made unscathed.

To give a size scope it's big enough to put an adult sized two person swing under it on one side and still have room for a five foot glass table with chairs on the opposite side.

@DeWayfarer That is huge!!!. I never saw a tree like that. I am glad it survived. I wonder if mine will survive? It did land in the top of another tree that is now supporting it.

@SW-User It's a protected tree here in California. And probably a couple of hundred years old. They take a long time to grow that big.

@DeWayfarer They sounds like they are awesome trees. I live in Ohio and I don't think they are here.

@SW-User No in fact they only grow in low mountainous 2000 to 4500 feet areas of Southern California. Below freezing is required to grow them but not below zero.

@DeWayfarer They would die here because it can get below zero.

@SW-User I know. 🙂 I have relatives in Iowa 🙂

@DeWayfarer Iowa is cold too. brrrr

@SW-User But not as cold as Cheyenne Wyoming. Lived there six years and once saw -50 not including wind chill.

@DeWayfarer I lived in South Dakota and it was that cold at times too. I did not like that. It was to cold for me.

@SW-User One of the reasons I left for good. But here is not too bad. Coldist I have seen here is 12.

@DeWayfarer 12 is not bad at all. I could live with that if it did not stay there for long.

@SW-User But I am at 4100 feet. Much warmer down below. In fact too hot.

@DeWayfarer I don't like heat either. I lived for a year in NC once. I hated that place. It felt like a bake oven it was so hot.

@SW-User Humidity probably played a lot with that. Lived for a little bit in Newport News Virginia. It got a bit humid there for a bit. Here it is a dry heat. Even here in the mountains. Very little humidity.

@DeWayfarer Humidity was bad there and it was suffocating to me.

@SW-User I bet it was. Didn't like Texas either, San Antonio area, because of the humidity.