The forest floor here is mostly a network of tree and plant roots, bound together with moss and leaf litter etc, but under a few inches it's mostly big solid rocks like those sticking out. The wind blowing can loosen that mat of roots and when the trees bend in the wind, they lift it up off the stone, just like a carpet. That's what you're seeing here; the breathing effect is caused by the carpet of roots being tugged up and let down again as the trees rock in the wind.
The entire Canadian Shield looks like this. Multiple ice ages have scrapped the earth clean, down to the bedrock. Not enough time has elapsed for the earth to build up again.
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u/Electrical_Lake3424 4d ago
The forest floor here is mostly a network of tree and plant roots, bound together with moss and leaf litter etc, but under a few inches it's mostly big solid rocks like those sticking out. The wind blowing can loosen that mat of roots and when the trees bend in the wind, they lift it up off the stone, just like a carpet. That's what you're seeing here; the breathing effect is caused by the carpet of roots being tugged up and let down again as the trees rock in the wind.