Jardine Juniper    abi-@u.washington.edu
   Aug 23, 2004 11:57 PDT 

Bob,

I have been out to the giant Juniperus scopulorum in Logan Canyon a few times. It has a very impressive 8 foot diameter but it is nearly dead. Last time I was there it had about a beach ball-sized amount of foliage remaining. An old photo I have from the 1930s shows the tree with much more foliage.

Age estimates on the tree range from 1200 to 3800 years, my guess is about 2200.

Cheers,
- BVP
  On Mon, 23 Aug 2004, Don Bragg wrote:
Unfortunately, no. My wife and I tried to hike to it one very warm spring day, but had to turn back due to overheating and lack of water. I do recall one summer working for the Shoshone National Forest in Wyoming I cored some Doug-fir and juniper in some inaccessible parts of the Absaroka Mountains, and was impressed when these relatively small individuals aged out at about 400 years.

DonC. Bragg, Ph.D.
Research Forester
USDA Forest Service
Southern Research Station


   Robert Leverett  wrote:

Don:

I just returned from Utah. My daughter lives in South Weber. Did you ever see that super old juniper (3000+ years maybe), which I think is somewhere in the vicinity of Logan canyon?

Bob
RE: Jardine Juniper    Robert Leverett
   Aug 23, 2004 12:01 PDT 

Bob:

   Thanks. I now remember you telling me about having visited it. Do you
consider it to represent the maximum age for the species or are you
aware of others in that age range? Are there other very old junipers in
the vicinity of that one? If isolated, any thoughts about why?

Bob
RE: Jardine Juniper    abi-@u.washington.edu
   Aug 24, 2004 09:23 PDT 

Bob,

The Jardine Juniper has no peer - either nearby or anywhere else. It is quite an outlier as far as size is concerned. Age is a different matter. Juniperus scopulorum over 1000 years are common, including several over 1,500 years. Ages over 2K are not crossdated, so must be viewed with skepticism.

Cheers,
- BVP