Lost and (under the right conditions) found

When I was a Boy Scout I was taught moss grows on the north side of trees, and you could use that info for direction finding in case (though they always framed it as inevitable) one got lost in a forest. Because I lived in a temperate zone, the only moss I knew of grew on the ground, and the stuff was rather rare. Also, it being a highly suburbanized region, there weren’t many forests, just patches of undeveloped land too steep for buildings and that were small enough to see and hear the civilized world from any point within the woods. Anyway, I thought that stupidly lost me would need to check on the ground at the base of trees for any moss there might be.

But there I was in an actual forest in the Pacific Northwest. The drizzle had stopped so it was a good time to go for a walk. The trailhead sign said it had been a clearcut forest in a previous century, which is why there were so many stumps and no huge trees. It was still foresty.

And there was a lot of moss. Everywhere. On the ground and, oh look, on the trees. And it tended to be on one side more than another. 

Could it be? So I checked the compass app on my phone (something no one had ever imagined back in 1964) and, sure enough, the moss was on the north side of the trees. And it revealed my assumed orientation to the planet had been 90° off. That was irrelevant because I was on a very clear trail that looped back to the parking lot and the Rolling Steel Tent.

It would have been more accurate and less frustrating if my Scout education had been more specific, like, “If you’re in a damp region there might be moss growing right on the trees. If so, it’s probably (but not always) on the north side…” Maybe they figured that was too nuanced for young teens, or that it revealed the adventurous outdoor life it promoted was not universally available.