The breathing forest

A video on Facebook shows what one could almost mistake for a special effect: the forest floor appears to “breathe”.

You can watch the relevant video here:

It's a little eerie what you see there: the forest floor rises and falls as if there were a huge lung underground.

Is the video real?

No CGI master worked on the video, the video is actually real!
The creator first posted it on the Facebook page “ We love Nova Scotia .” Unfortunately, the post has now been deleted, but many other users uploaded the video again.

Where does it come from and what is happening there?

The name of the Facebook page where it first appeared gives us a clue: In the forests of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. the Independent , the creator of the video
also commented According to the Weather Network , the video was taken on October 16th in Sacre-Coeur in the Canadian province of Quebec, almost 900 kilometers away.

However, the fact that the floor “breathes” is an optical illusion.
In the video you can clearly see that there is a strong wind blowing. During a heavy rain, the forest floor becomes saturated with water and loosens the bond between the roots and the soil. This doesn't work in every forest when it rains and storms, but is more likely the more spruce trees there are. They have a more disc-shaped root system, which extends more in width and less in depth.

The wind now pushes against the crowns of the trees, which then lean to the side and use their broad roots to lift the loosened forest floor. However, if the wind were to blow stronger and more persistently, the trees would break out of the ground and fall over, as in the picture above.

Conclusion

A real video, a fascinating optical illusion of a “breathing” forest floor.
However, it is only the wind that sets the spruce trees in motion, which then use their roots to raise and lower the forest floor. You can also see the explanation in English here: