There are places in this universe that are very different from the planet you and I inhabit. Take, for example, the planet Orotoro in NGC 5194 (the Whirlpool Galaxy). Plants have never evolved the tree form on Orotoro. But there are still things that look like trees. Despite their appearance, these structures are actually made of rock and moss. The moss on Orotoro is able to secrete a substance that softens most kinds of rock. The moss then shapes the rock into towers and secretes another substance to restore the hardness of the rock. The moss that grows the tallest rock spire can't be shaded, so these rock spires often serve the same function as forests on our world.
Some species of moss are also motile. They will climb a rock spire and try to kill the moss that built it so that they can take its place. They are slow-moving, though, so it can take weeks for such a moss to climb to the top of even a modest-sized spire. It's also not uncommon to see bits of moss growing on the heads and shoulders of many of the animal inhabitants of Orotoro. In the autumn, the mosses produce spores that look like little pumpkins that fill the air with drifting orange clouds.
These illustrations were drawn using Stable Diffusion 2.1.
