| Report;
Welwyn Preserve, Long Island |
edward
coyle |
| Dec
01, 2004 15:45 PST |
Hello ENTS,
I am working my way through Long Island parks and preserves in
search of
great trees. As you may have guessed these are in short supply
here.
Having been extensively populated since the 1850's most of the
land was
cleared for buildings or farms. The farms were built on the
Hempstead
Plains, a natural prairie of some 60,000 acres.
Two exceptions seem to have been the 'Pine Barrens', an
extensive dwarf
pitch pine forest, whose underlying ground would not support
crops, and the
north shore area of Great Neck and Huntington.
In 1947 wholesale development began on the former farmland.
Small trees
were planted, or allowed to grow, and make up the majority of
the trees in
Nassau County(60~years).
The north shore seems to have always attracted wealthy
landholders who
held on to what they had, including trees. This culminated in
the building
of great private estates between 1900-1930's. Trees were spared,
and in
fact, added to with exotics. Since that time most of the estates
have been
aquired by various government bodies through attrition and are
now parks and
preserves.
Many others have been razed and their lands developed upon- the
trees
lost.
Welwyn Preserve tree list
species hgt
cbh
tulip
142.2' 144"
" "
147.1' 110"
" "
149.0' -----
" "
149.3' 141.5"
" "
149.6' 162.5"
Red Oak 122.7' 146"
" "
120.1' 113"
" "
128.8' 105.5"
(one sprig)
Black Oak 106.3' 85"
Beech
115.0' 79"
Sweet Birch 107.3' 53"
Yellow Birch 94.6' 56"
Sassafras 107.3' 75.5"
White Oak 108.9' 84.5"
White Ash 115.3 94"
(aprox cbh)
I hope to improve on most of these numbers, especially tulip!
Ed
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