Greetings, Fellow Ents!
I thought I'd take a different direction with this post, and
instead of
looking at the largest and oldest trees in the more wild parts
of the
state, I would instead bring to light some of the survivors -
trees that
don't live anywhere near the wilderness, but have still managed
to reach
a respectable size either by having lived most of their life
before
development reached them or by simply being lucky enough to be
on
relatively protected ground.
- The Swimming Pool Oak: This one's an easy one since it dwells
on the
apartment grounds where I live. In the center of the apartment
complex,
there is a collection of trees of numerous species, many of
which are
too strange a choice to have been planted there by the
developers that
built the apartment complex years ago. Most likely, they were
simply
left behind - relics of the former woodlands - as the apartment
buildings were built around them. Aside from some black
cherries, a mix
of pine trees (pitch, white, etc.), and a few other oddities,
the most
impressive tree by far is the huge southern red oak that stands
near the
inground swimming pool.
Swimming Pool Oak
This tree is quite respectable by any standard, measuring about
10'
around in girth. The broad, spreading crown (taller than the 3
story
apartment buildings) is almost perfectly symmetrical as all the
limbs
radiate from the single, column-like central trunk. Aside from
some poor
"topping" of some of ends of the lower limbs, the tree
is in excellent
health. Despite that, I really get the impression that the
people who
run this apartment complex have no real idea just how special
this tree
is... some of them may not even be aware of it. I guess it is a
secret
that stands in broad daylight!
- The Quarterfield Maple: Up near the intersection of
Quarterfield Road
and Route 3, there is a school, and this tree stands across from
it. It
is a broken down ruin of what once must have been a monstrous
tree; I
measured it to be over 14' around beneath the first limb, but
that was a
couple of years ago and the tree has continued to fall apart
since then.
Today, it is little more than a broken, crumbling, hollowed-out
trunk
with a single huge limb jutting out to one side. The limb alone
is the
size of a tree in its own right. Sadly, this tree is not at all
well
maintained, and I suspect it will eventually be cut down since
it stands
right next to the road and near where students walk to school.
One look
at where it stands makes it clear that the whole area was once
very
different, and those changes (new roads, changing the grade of
the soil,
etc.) may have been what weakened this tree so seriously.
Quarterfield Maple
- The Silver Monster: Not sure what else to call this absurdly
huge
silver maple that lurks less than a mile from the Quarterfield
Maple on
the grounds of a local garden center. This tree is HUGE! It's
base
consists of two fused trunks, one about 3 to 4 feet in diameter,
the
other about 4 to 5 feet in diameter. Since they are fused
together, the
result is a wall of wood as one gets close to the tree. Height-wise,
I am
not sure, except that it stands taller than almost anything else
in the
area and that is AFTER it was brutally topped many years ago.
Today, the
tree is a strange monster, with 5 or so thick limbs reaching
skywards,
each covered with shoots and small limbs since all of the main
branches
were topped or removed years ago. Sadly, the tree is slowly
losing to
time. It leaves out late in the year and is so old that it no
longer
sets seeds. Still, even in decline, it is a stunning monster of
a tree.
Silver Monster
Anyway, I hope this post encourages folks to find the hidden
survivors
in their own subdivisions, shopping malls, and built-up areas.
Good
luck!
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