The dried base of leaves that forms the mask-like face of the plant thrusts up above the supporting branch like a crown. In places these have weathered away, or been eaten by insects, to leave a lacy fretwork of veins like a skeletal tiara above the plant. Pockets of detritus are trapped behind them, a fertile patch for tree-gardens. A thriving community of plants flourish - grasses, weeds, orchids and more ferns. Mosses grow beneath the stag-horns, and ferns and orchids thread their roots among the interlaced bases.
Aerial roots hang down, and seed-heads peep from above the parapet of dried fronds.
Staring up at this single-tree celebration of biodiversity, I could only imagine what it would look like in the wet season, with the orchids blooming and the feathery little ferns richly green, the moss glowing emerald. I call them stag-horns, but they are not entirely like the garden variety I know. For once my Scientific Advisor admitted defeat. I don't think they're ferns. I think they're some kind of giant moss.