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TOPIC: Another tree mini-study
http://groups.google.com/group/entstrees/browse_thread/thread/742b09dfb171d321?hl=en
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== 1 of 3 ==
Date: Tues, Jun 17 2008 12:31 pm
From: dbhguru@comcast.net

ENTS,

The Excel attachment contains another tree profile that I was doing in Look Park earlier today. Threat of rain caused me to cut the mini-study short, but the data I did collect continues to tell the story. No surprises. But in the case of the Look Park sycamore, an additional lesson gets reinforced. There is no reason for a person with tape and clinometer to choose the actual high point of the sycamore as the point to measure, i.e. identifying it as the true top, because from any direction, the actual highest point never looks to be the highest. And due to the actual high point's positioning in the interior of the crown, it will be measured to a height slightly less than its actual height.
There is yet another lesson. In circling the tree, there is no place where you can identify the high point at a lateral direction to the line from measurer to trunk. Big Don's method of using distance from meaurer to trunk as a substitute for the hypotenuse of the horizontal right triangle in which the hypotenuse is the right base line for the high point. That nifty shortcut can be implemented with the right equipment as illustrated in the first line of the spreadsheet. I made the shortcut work, remembering that the high point did not in fact appear to be the high point from my vantage point. Without my TruPulse 360, I could not have lined the point up laterally.

The mini-study reinforces the big lesson: broad-crowned hardwoods do not lend themselves to the tangent method. That technique can work for properly behaved trees, but carries an inordinate level of risk for tall, spreading trees and points to the need for a special ENTS focus on places like Congaree, awash in broad-crowned hardwoods.

Bob

== 2 of 3 ==
Date: Tues, Jun 17 2008 1:53 pm
From: "Edward Frank"

Bob,

Keep up the experiments. They are interesting. This is your third tree mini-study in the past couple weeks. Maybe next time you should try a study of mini-trees!

Ed

== 3 of 3 ==
Date: Tues, Jun 17 2008 2:11 pm
From: dbhguru@comcast.net

Ed,

Actually, examining a head high shrub or bush up close allows one to better visualize the complexity of the crown of a large tree and appreciate what it takes to isolate the highest twig and accurately measure it. Without an up close and personal examination, we tend to create idealized stick figures.

If all goes well, Monica and I are heading to Idaho on Saturday. My reporting in will be sporadic, but of the forests I see going and coming, and if lucky some western white pines. That's my hope.

Bob