Tlukvaequabora

Replacing their ancestor the fuzzbora in all overlapping environments, the equabora is a true giant. Doubling in size, they tower over the surf. They form sprawling mangrove forests along the coasts of the major Barlowean landmasses. They play a vital role in the landscape of the coastal shorelines of Barlowe, as their deep roots provide a barrier against the eroding forces of the tidewaters and storm surges by trapping sediment with their roots.

Size
Reaching heights that dwarf all but the largest individual Terran trees, undisturbed equabora can reach sizees of upwards of 100 meters in height, with an average diameter reaching 10 meters at the base. Because of its size, the equabora has had to further develop their abilities to pull water to the top of their. Water from the roots can be pushed up only a few meters by osmotic pressure, but can reach the full height of the equabora by using large negative pressures in the equabora's water tubules and subpressure from evaporating water at the leaves. Equaboras supplement water from the sand with fog, taken up through aerial roots that grow near the base of their puff stem junction.

Salt adaptations
To protect themselves from excess salinity in the soil of the intertidal zones, they have developed a series of adaptions that both prevent the uptake of a significant amount of salt, and remove any that may end up in their vascular systems. These adaptations allow for the delineation of the two major life stages of the equabora, marked primarily by their major methods of dealing with salinity; the pre-reproductive “secretor” stage and the fully grown “non- secretor” stage. The first stage, secretor, is geared towards protecting the equabora while they are growing. Specialized glands within the equabora, called salinicoules, concentrate the salt in hypersaline solution and excrete it through pores within their leaves and along the surface of their bark. As the water evaporates, salt crystals often form on the surface of the equabora. This has the added benefit of making the growing equabora unpalatable to most herbivores, protecting the growing seedlings from predation until they reach sufficient size for reproduction. Once reaching maturity, they will have reach a size where pumping salinate water all the way towards their leaves become impractical. Once they have begun this stage, their energy focus will shift towards reproduction and bark reinforcement, entering the “non-secretor” stage. They will grow thick roots and hides reinforced with lignin and suberin, acting as a filter preventing the uptake of salts. This is not perfect barrier, preventing about 80% of sodium salts from being absorbed. While this stage is called non-secretor, it is a bit of a misnomer, as they still will secrete some salts from their bodies, but instead of coating the flora any salts that remain within are excreted into "sacrificial leaves", which are leaves nearing the end of their productivity that will be dropped into the surf. These adaptaions allow equaboras to grow in salinities up to 45 parts per thousand (ppt), though they grow optimally in salinities between 2 and 19 ppt.

Roots
Root Aeration The soil where mangroves are rooted poses a second challenge for plants as it is severely lacking in oxygen. Even though plants use photosynthesis to produce energy, they must then use that fuel through cellular respiration to power their cells and, like animals, consume oxygen. Most plants can easily take oxygen from gases trapped within the surrounding soil, but for mangrove roots this is not an option and they need an access to air. Not only are mangrove roots underground, they are also flooded with water up to two times a day. This unique environment allowed for the evolution of a variety of special structures that help the underground roots gain access to air, even when submerged by the tide.

Reproduction
Life by the ocean has its perks—for equabora, proximity to the waves and tides helps with reproduction.

Range
The oldest mangroves are around the northern shores of the Solpimr and southern Ovi islands. In these old growth areas, they can grow up to a 1.5 km off shore, though there are many pockets of mangrove islets off in the coastal waters. These islets formed thanks to the relative shallow waters of the coastal areas, with various sandbars and reef pockets dotting along the seabed. These shoals are the remains of once higher elevated sections of Barlowe, though weathering has sunk much, it has left enough near the surface to allow equabora to establish themselves and stabilize the soil.

=Relationship with other species= The large scale spread of equabora to all tropical and temperate waters of Barlowe are thanks to three factors: the tamshrews, currents, and tropical storms.

As they are a descendant of the fuzzbora, they have allowed the dispersal of all bora communal species.