| Tamassee
Creek/Station Creek |
Jess |
| Mar
25, 2002 05:38 PST |
Tamassee
Creek flows through the calcareous Brevard Belt a few miles
north
of Walhalla, South Carolina. The creek is only a couple of miles
north of
the spectacular forests surrounding Tamassee Knob, so I was
hoping to see
similar towering hardwoods along the creek. Unfortunately, the
forest
service maintains the large flats along the creek as fields of
grass with
a narrow corridor of tuliptrees and sweetgums along the creek.
Upstream of
the fields the soil is not as rich as that around Tamassee Knob,
and the
forest contains a much greater proportion of conifers. The
section of this
conifer forest that grows in the gorge like area below a
waterfall was cut
only lightly if at all. Both hemlock and tuliptree in this area
probably
exceed 200 years in age.
Where Station Creek encounters the
Brevard Belt about four miles south
of Tamassee Creek the stream forms the popular Station Cove
Falls. The
forest immediately below the falls has been described as "a
remnant of
old-growth forest (140 to 175 years old)" and "one of
the best examples of
a mixed mesophytic cove forest in South Carolina" (Gaddy A
Naturalist's
Guide to the Southern Blue Ridge Front). I'm not sure where the
age
information came from, but the latter description is well
deserved. The
forest is dominated by a mix of hardwoods rather than a single
species.
Tuliptree, white ash, bitternut hickory, white basswood,
american beech,
and northern red oak are all common in the canopy. Yellow
buckeye, at the
extreme southeastern edge of its range, is restricted to the
mid-story over
american hornbeam and paw paw in the under-story. The diverse
herbaceous
ground cover has made the site well know among botanists and the
site may
support "more wildflowers and herbaceous plants per square
foot" than any
other area in northwestern South Carolina (Gaddy Naturalist's
Guide). This
description peeked my interest since I think there is a positive
correlation between herbaceous density and tree height. I did
only a
cursory revue of the rich forest below the falls to avoid
disturbing the
below there to see the falls and to avoid trampling the
wildflowers. I
spent most of my time looking at the drier oak, dominated flat
downstream
of the falls. The forest below the falls includes tuliptrees to
over 150',
bitternut hickory to over 130', white ash that probably exceed
130', and an
unidentified elm that is likely over 120' tall.
Species cbh height location
Birch, Black 4'7" 96.9' Tamassee
Creek
Birch, Black 5'2" 109.6' Tamassee
Creek
Hemlock 9'4" 140.4' Tamassee
Creek
Oak, White 8'4" 121.2' Tamassee
Creek
Oak, White 7'4" 133.4' Station
Creek
Oak, White 8'11" 141.8' Station
Creek
Pine, Virginia 3'9" 107.9' Tamassee
Creek
Sycamore 6'9" 126.9' Tamassee Creek
Walnut, White 3'7.5" 86.7' Tamassee
Creek
I want to go back and check the heights on some of the Tamassee
Creek trees
because the for them are greater than the trees look. I took a
second
height on the tallest white oak that was shorter than the first.
I have
listed the higher measurement here because shooting vertically
on the tree
gave around 139', and that measurement was probably not all the
way to the
top twig since the upper crown is narrow. The difference in
measurements
may result from obscuring brush causing an artificial shoot
distance
reading to the base of the tree. The birch, oak, pine and walnut
are all
the tallest I have measured in South Carolina and all exceed the
tallest of
their species I have measured in Georgia. The Brevard Belt north
of
Walhalla supports some of the finest cove forests in the
southern
Appalachians.
Jess Riddle |
|