The
Ice Glen Story |
Robert
Leverett |
Mar
03, 2002 13:39 PST |
Hi
Folks:
Kim Jensen and I
returned to Ice Glen today to continue documenting
its wealth of superlative trees. Kim had limited time, so our
focus was on:
(1) verifying the Shagbark Hickory champ, (2) searching for
other tall white
ash trees, and looking for other 120-foot tall Hemlocks. Tree
viewing was
perfect and we were able to confirm a large white ash to 135.3
feet, using
two sets of instruments. Kim's measurements slightly exceeded
136 feet. The
circumference of the tree is 10.4 feet. We confirmed the
Shagbark Hickory.
My calculation was 131.2 feet. My original was 131.7 feet. After
Kim left, I
continued on and found an ash that measures a very impressive
134.0 feet in
height and is 8.6 feet in circumference. This ash and the
135.3-footer are
the two tallest hardwoods in Ice Glen. I've now measured four
White Ash
trees in Ice Glen to over 130 feet in height.
The following
list includes all trees measured today for height and
girth. A Red Maple along the trail was measured at 102 feet, but
a girth
measurement wasn't taken and I confirmed 4 White Pines at
between 137 and 39
feet.
Species Height Circ Comments
WP 142.9' 8.8' New
WP 142.3' 7.9' New
WA 135.3' 10.4' Confirmation
WA 134.0' 8.6' New
SBH 131.2' 5.0' Confirmation
HM 123.3' 7.6' New
HM 121.7' 8.2' New
SBH 117.7' 6.4' New
AE 115.2' 6.1' New
and new record for American
Elm
SBH 113.8' 3.8' New
WO 106.7' 7.4' New
and new record for White Oak
WP=White Pine, WA=White Ash, SBH=Shagbark Hickory, HM=Hemlock,
AE=American
Elm, WO=White Oak
So between yesterday and today, 4 new
height champions were confirmed.
Only one, the Catalpa, is new to my list as a species. All
others are
improvements.
Ice Glen now boasts 5 height champions
for Massachusetts. They are:
Species Height Circ
HM 136.6' 10.2'
SBH 131.7' 5.0'
BC 121.9' 7.1'
(Black Cherry)
AE 115.2' 6.1'
WO 106.7' 7.4'
The height champion for all Ice Glen is
the huge Ice Glen Pine at 152.1
feet in height and 12.8 feet in circumference. So far I've
confirmed 11
pines to over 140 feet. White Pines over 130 feet in height are
common in
Ice Glen.
Well, checking the score card, four
species have been confirmed to
heights of 130 feet or more in Ice Glen and 5 to over 120 feet.
Twelve
species top 100 feet. With in the Glen, itself, there are trees
in the 250 -
350 year age range.
The largest circumferences trees in Ice
Glen are 10 - 12 feet around,
with trees in the 10-foot circumference range generously
distributed.
Once upon a time, there would have been
many Ice Glens and big, tall
hardwoods would have been everywhere. Tall White Pines would
have been in
strips and patches.
Ice Glen is not a bad place to visit to
see big, impressive trees.
Bob |
Ice
Glen Rules |
Robert
Leverett |
Jun
02, 2002 14:52 PDT |
Ents:
We went, we measured, we left. Kim
Jensen, Ken Greason, and myself
roamed through the underbrush looking upward, trying to find new
ice Glen
champions. The list now reads as follows.
Species Height Girth New
Find
White Pine 153.2' 12.8' no
White Ash 137.6' 9.6' no
Hemlock 136.6' 10.2' no
Shagbark Hickory 131.2' 5.0' no
Black Cherry 121.9 7.1' no
Pignut Hickory 120.8 6.4' no
Red Maple 115.6' 4.9
' yes
American Elm 115.2' 6.1' no
N. Red Oak 110.9' 7.3' yes
Bitternut Hickory 108.3' 5.7' no
American Basswood 107.5' 5.7' yes
White Oak 106.7' 7.4' no
Sugar Maple 106.5' 5.6' yes
Black Birch 102.3' 4.7' no
Averaging the
tallest member of the top ten species yields a site
average of 125.12 feet. This should move Ice Glen up slightly in
Colby
Rucker's rankings. However, I don't think the Glen has much more
potential.
Perhaps future confirmations will move the average up to between
125.5 and
126.0, but that will be it. In terms of the number of species
over 100 feet,
the number may stay at 14. Yellow Birch might make it, but that
is far from
a certainty. I expect to eventually find a Sugar Maple in the
115-foot
class.
What about the
other tall tree site in Massachusetts? I am confident
that Mohawk Trail State Forest will eventually make a 130-foot
average.
Perhaps 131, but that will likely be it. Elsewhere in the NE,
Cook Forest
may eventually move up to 131.5 or 132. I expect Zoar Valley, NY
will
eventually move to around 127. Green Lake will likely move up to
119.5.
Given what we've compiled so far, I now
believe that a 130-foot average
for the tallest of the top ten species pushes the site in the
Northeast to
their limits at the latitude of 41 degrees north or higher. By
the time the
latitude of central New Jersey has been reached, it might be a
new ball
game, but that remains to be seen.
Bob |
More
musings about ENTS and back to business |
dbhg-@comcast.net |
Oct
30, 2004 16:19 PDT |
Don:
This afternoon I gave a lecture at the
Berkshire Botanical Gardens and it was well received. We then
went to Ice Glen where I found another splendid ash tree. At
137.6 ft x 8.9 ft, it is most handsome. It isn't far away from
the 140-footer.
I remeasured the Ice Glen champion
hemlock and it now stands 138.1 feet tall and is 10.3 feet
around. If the adelgid doesn't get it, it actually has a chance
to reach 140 feet in 3 or 4 years. Ice Glen's Rucker Index now
stands at 126.2.
Bob |
Viva
La Modeling |
Robert
Leverett |
Aug
08, 2005 06:05 PDT |
ENTS:
Saturday and Sunday was devoted to
tree modeling using the RD 1000
Relascope/dendrometer. Beyond the simple diameter at breast
height
exercises that I had satisfactorily done, the weekend's modeling
projects were my first real opportunities to see just how well
the
device works on whole tree modeling, both with and without a
tripod. I
tackled the Ice Glen Pine, solo, on Saturday without a tripod.
Monica
communed with the trees and rocks of Ice Glen while I measured
the huge
Ice Glen pine. Then on Sunday John Knuerr, Susan Scott and I
modeled the
Jake Swamp white pine in MTSF using a tripod. In terms of the
ease of
use of the RD 1000, I'll cut to the chase. It is accurate as
advertised,
but lots of technical/practical considerations make modeling a
whole
tree much more complicated than just shooting a diameter at
breast
height plus one or two upper trunk measurements. Please be
forewarned.
The process is labor intensive. For starters, intervening
branches from
nearby trees as well as the target tree can obscure the trunk at
key
height intervals and require frequent changes of vantage point.
It
became very apparent that use of the included magnifier lens is
necessary to adequately see the trunk in many if not most
situations.
However, built-in limitations on how wide the scale can be
expanded
means that if you get too close, you can’t cover the entire
trunk, so
you must change vantage points to get the benefit of
magnification.
One thing is absolutely
certain, you can't take too many
cross-checking measurements. If you accept one measurement at a
particular height, then you are fooling yourself about accuracy.
Unfortunately when starting out it isn't obvious what the best
measurement plan is for a tree unless it has been thoroughly
scrutinized
beforehand. So expect some false starts. Also, better have a
good tripod
that allows delicate movements both laterally and vertically.
The tripod
we used was difficult to move horizontally. It did so in fits
and jerks,
which was not good for aligning the diameter scale against the
trunk.
The problem elicited some choice mumblings from me - under my
breath of
course.
Anyway, I computed 42
diameters for the Ice Glen pine, but used
only 16 sections. Many of my first measurements were taken from
too
great a distance when I was trying to see the whole tree. I
eventually
had to move much closer and use magnification. John Knuerr and I
used 18
measurements for the Jake Swamp Tree. Susan Scott took some of
the
measurements and we also had a UMASS student participating.
So what did we get? I’m
pleased to announce that Jake's volume is
about 660 cubic feet. That isn’t much different from some of
my early
cruder calculations. However, I am elated to announce that the
Ice Glen
pine is an impressive 1204 cubic feet. This was a surprising. I
did
think it would make 1,000, but not 1200. So, the Ice Glen pine
is a true
giant. BTW, its circumference at 4.5 feet is now 13 feet even.
That may
be in part a result of be giving the big tree the benefit of the
doubt
as to base point. An older spotting of the base would have
produced 12.9
feet.
By contrast, the circumference of
Jake, which is about half the age
of the Ice Glen pine, is a solid 10.4 feet. So the difference of
2.6
feet in circumference and the Ice Glen’s more columnar form
makes a heck
of a difference. No surprise there. Incidentally, the Ice Glen
pine's
height was measured at 153.3 feet. It is growing more slowly
than Jake.
What are the odds that we would be
at the Jake tree and not measure
its height? Foolish question. John Knuerr and I measured Jake's
final
season height at a cool 167.3 feet and we did it from an
entirely new
location. So I'm very satisfied that Jake's height is rock
solid. We’ve
measured and re-measured using different equipment and measurers
from
different locations. Jakes vital measurements can now be
recorded for
posterity.
As of August 7, 2005:
Full Height ---------------
167.3 feet
DBH
-------------------------- 10.4 feet
Max Crown spread
-------- 46.0 feet
Trunk and limb volume
--- 660 cubic feet
Approximate board feet
-- 660 x 12 x 0.50 = 3960 bdft (The
assumed 50% usage is my guess. That might be a little low. I
defer to
our foresters to provide a more realistic conversion factor.)
Measuring Team:
Robert Leverett
John Knuerr
Susan Scott
Observer:
Martha Jorz, UMASS
student
I presume the huge Ander's Run
white pine in PA will top 1200 cubic
feet and the Seneca Pine in Cook Forest will approach 1,000
cubic feet.
The Tamworth pine in NH will certainly top 1200 cubic feet. The
Bradford
Pine in NH will top 1000 cubic feet. The other huge 12-foot plus
circumference white pine in Cook Forest may go to 1,000 cubic
feet.
So at present, we have a handful
of great whites in the Northeast
that will make the magic number of 1,000 cubes.
Bob
Robert T. Leverett
Cofounder, Eastern Native Tree Society
|
Sweet
Taste of Victory - Ice Glen |
Robert
Leverett |
Sep
21, 2006 12:54 PDT |
ENTS,
...
On the way to the meeting I
stopped at Ice Glen and communed with
some old friends. When in the Glen, I always visit a particular
white
ash. It is a beauty. This morning it received its formal ENTS
name
"Monarch of the Glen". Guess where that name came
from? Well, of course
I had to remeasure the Monarch. Its revised statistics are:
Hgt: 138.4 ft
Cir: 11.2 ft (conservative)
This is one great white ash tree,
folks. Its 42.8-inch diameter is
very high on the list of ashes with a 100 % forest-grown shape
in New
England. There a re a few larger ones, but not many. So three
cheers for
the Monarch of the Glen.
I had time for one other
measurement and chose a trailside pine.
The trail's close passing obscures the height of the tree. I
eventually
found the top at 148.1 feet above the base. Its 7.8-foot girth
is hardly
noticeable in Ice Glen. What a great place!
Bob
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