Growing Bull Kelp

~ Kelp plants grow from seeds
~ Grows up to surface then stops
~ Grows old bobbing in the waves
~ "Dies" and starts over again.
~ Kelp fronds turn and hang down "current".
~ Plant an ever changing kelp forest!
~ Almost as mesmerizing as the real thing!
~ COPY so you can plant as many as you need.

These plants simulate a complex ever changing environment for your underwater setting. Drag a bunch of them out of inventory onto the bottom of your lake or bay. They start out as small plants and grow taller until they reach the surface. There they bob in the waves for a while, turning their leaves to hang down wind. When they grow old they "die", drop a seed and start all over again. The whole life cycle takes a only a minute or two so your kelp forest will be constantly changing, mesmerizing you and your friends. Growth starts when you rez a seed, so at first the plants may all grow and die together. But the growth rate of each plant is slightly different and they will settle into random behavior in the long term. These plants are COPY so you can plant a whole kelp forest of them!

Find links to my stores at http://magic.kayaker.net

These plants grow best if planted in 3 to 10 meters of water. They stop growing when they reach the surface, so placing them in shallow water will stunt their growth. This species of kelp can only grow 10 meters tall, so they will not reach the surface if planted in water too deep. If sewn on the ground, they will die.

The texture map of the kelp leaves comes from a photo I took while on a kayak expedition near Tofino, Vancouver Island, BC.

Getting Started:
When you purchase Growing Bull Kelp, you receive a "Grow Kelp Installer" in the Objects folder of your inventory. If you rez this installer on your property and click it, it will automatically create a folder named "Wind Wonders" in your inventory with a "Grow Kelp" and a copy of this "Growing Bull Kelp" document. If under water, click on the installer again to rez six kelp plants and start your kelp forest. Plant more of them by dragging them out of your inventory onto the ground. The installer will self destruct after 20 seconds (leaving the original copy in your inventory).

If you don't want this automatic behavior then instead of left-clicking the installer ,you can right-click to open the installer and drag the contents into any other folder in your inventory.

Why is it Pointing That Way?
To simulate kelp pointing down-current, I used the wind in Second Life. Yes, SL has wind and it is done using a cool, interesting, complex, fluid dynamics simulation. See http://www.multires.caltech.edu/teaching/demos/java/stablefluids.htm for a visual demonstration of how this works and some references. This causes the wind to swirl around in ways that are impossible for us mere mortals to predict. But now you can tell which way the wind is blowing by looking at how the kelp is hanging. (Surface water does flow in the same direction as the wind if not overpowered by tides).

The wind in SL can change direction in a very short distance. So the wind at the center stalk may be pointing in a different direction than at the end of the leaves! The flexi leaves will curl around to indicate this. Your viewer may also have a wind direction that is a few seconds out of date from the server. The stalk uses the server value while the flexi leaves use the out-of-date viewer value. At very low wind speeds the kelp may quickly point in random seeming directions.

Lag Issues:
To reduce lag, this kelp checks the changing wind direction infrequently, only once a second. It is a non-physical object which is naturally low-lag. Of course putting large numbers of kelp plants (or any other object) on your land may eventually create lag. If this happens try deleting some of them.