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TOPIC: Behind our house
http://groups.google.com/group/entstrees/browse_thread/thread/97028567002cb5a9?hl=en
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== 1 of 5 ==
Date: Sun, Apr 27 2008 1:31 pm
From: dbhguru@comcast.net


ENTS,

Returning from North Carolina and the ENTS rendezvous, Monica and I were tired. My shingle pain had returned from all the riding, several hikes in which I overdid it in terms of elevational gain, and a daunting family crisis with one of my children. I needed to stay put and recouperate, so I spent parts of Friday and Saturday in the woods behind my wife's house taking short walks. I especially wanted to reestablish my ties to those woods and to particular trees that have come to give me comfort. Increasingly, I turn to my connection to these trees to draw strength.
I confess that I am sentenced to make comparisons between trees, mountains, rivers, lakes, the weather, etc.- just about any thing that has measurements associated with it. In terms of both forests and mountains, Great Smokies and southern Appalachians in general are hard acts to follow. Yet, in the forest no more than 500 feet from the house, I measured a lone pitch pine on Friday to 90 feet - a tree that had previously escaped my notice. That is only the second 90-footer Pitch Pine I've measured in Massachusetts. The lone Pitch Pine is competing with the accompanying White Pines that reach to between 120 and 125 feet.
On Saturday, I walked upstream along Broad Brook and confirmed another white pine in the 130-foot class. I now have the following confirmations on upper Broadk Brook: 136.0, 133.7, 132.6, and 132.0. At 129.8 feet, a fifth is poised to enter the club this year.
Today, I added a pignut hickory at 117.1 feet. The Rucker Index for the upper Broad Brook corridor is as follows.


Rucker Height Index Report
Location String: Broadbrook
Height Species Location Circumference ENTS Points DOM-Last
136.0 White Pine MA-Florence-Broadbrook-Upper 14.3 1944.8 4/27/2008
127.2 Tuliptree MA-Florence-Broadbrook-Monica 6.6 839.6 11/5/2006
120.0 Hemlock MA-Florence-Broadbrook-Monica 8.1 972.0 9/16/2007
117.1 Pignut Hickory MA-Florence-Broadbrook-Upper 4.9 573.6 4/27/2008
110.7 N. Red Oak MA-Florence-Broadbrook-Monica 5.5 608.9 11/5/2006
109.7 White Oak MA-Florence-Broadbrook-Monica 6.9 757.3 5/5/2007
107.4 Scarlet Oak MA-Florence-Broadbrook-Monica 7.3 784.0 10/15/2005
106.9 Black Birch MA-Florence-Broadbrook-Upper 6.3 673.7 4/27/2008
106.5 Sugar Maple MA-Florence-Broadbrook-Monica 6.9 734.7 5/5/2007
105.5 White Ash MA-Florence-Broadbrook-Monica 4.5 474.6 2/12/2006

Rucker Index
114.70 7.1 834.6

There are more discoveries to be made that will probably raise the RHI to around 115.0. I suppose it could go to 115.5, but above that would push all kinds of limits for the stream corridor. However, I'll gladly settle for what I've currently confirmed.
In terms of tree species diversity, there are at least 27 species of native trees along the upper Broad Brook corridor. The entire brook supports 30 or 31. That's not overwhelming diversity, but it isn't too shabby, bearing in mind that the 27 is along a narrow corridor of about 1.4 miles.
In addition to the above superlative trees, I've now measured three Pignuts to over 113 feet and an equal number of hemlocks in that same height range. One hundred footers are common among the hardwoods and hemlocks and 120-footers are common among the white pines. Although Broad Brook isn't the Smokies, I'm counting my tree blessings these days.

Bob