Borneo Rucker   bor-@gci.net
  Sep 25, 2005 13:16 PDT 

A few years (October 29 and 30, 2002) ago BVP posted a conjecture that
the Rucker Index for Borneo would make his list of places that exceed
200 feet.

Well, we now have the data to show that the current Rucker Index for
Sabah, the Malaysian state of northern Borneo (26,000 sq miles or so),
is 256.15 feet. This puts Borneo on the short list of places that exceed
250 feet, above Washington and below Australia (although the list Bob
posted is likely out of date by now for actual numbers).

We (including Australian big tree hunter Brett Mifsud and super-climber
Tom Greenwood) were sponsored by National Geographic and so can not
publicly describe our results just yet.

Of 17 species from 4 families in Sabah that we have measured using
Impulse 200 LR and tape drop methods, 15 species from 3 families reach
over 200 feet, and 6 species from 2 families are over 250 feet.

The lowland tropical rain forests where these tall trees grow are
marvelously diverse. Their climate reminds me of the USA's eastern
seaboard during midsummer, with similar temperatures, humidity, but far
more noisy cicadas species and near West-coast sized trees. The tall
trees of Borneo are all hardwood and so their crowns make for super
fun climbing as well.

Roman Dial
Re: Borneo Rucker   MICHAEL DAVIE
  Sep 25, 2005 19:16 PDT 

Well,
That's just fantastic.
Congratulations. If there's any more you can say, feel free, I know many
would love to hear it...What species are there, and how different from, say,
Sulawesi, Sumatran, or New Guinea forests in composition and stature? Has
anyone measured much in many of these other places? Any of these things you
are at liberty to discuss I'd love to hear.
RE: Borneo Rucker   Robert Leverett
  Sep 26, 2005 09:01 PDT 

Roman,

   Can we ask you to give us a little biograophical sketch of yourself?
We're absolutely blown over by your report and honored that you have
shared the Rucker information on Borneo with us. Where all do you go to
study/climb/measure great trees? Please tell us.

   In this era of planetary forest shrinkage, areas such as you identify
are true treasures. Their inaccessibility to the general public, plus
the technical difficulties of getting accurate tree dimension data on
them, puts these tropical forest gems in a class all by themselves. I
can only visualize the size of the insects, spiders, and snakes that you
must come across. Wow! My hat is off to you.    

Bob
RE: Borneo Rucker   Will Blozan
  Sep 26, 2005 14:40 PDT 

Wow!

As a matter of great interest to me as a tree climber, how did your Impulse
readings compare to the tape drops?

Very exiting stuff! Thank you so much for the update and I look forward to
more information!

Will Blozan
RE: Borneo Rucker    Roman Dial
   Sep 26, 2005 22:20 PDT 

Thanks for all the encouraging responses to the Borneo finds. It's
exciting to share them with such an enthusiastic audience.

I'll start with my narrow connection to the big tree world. My PhD work
was on canopy ecology of Caribbean anoles (little green lizards we
called chameleons when we were kids). That research was almost too long
ago to mention, but as a graduate student I shared my dream of extensive
horizontal canopy movement (one month without coming down -- like the
Baron in the Trees!) with George Koch, who was even then (early 90's)
working with Steve Sillett (the two and a grad student of Steve's
recently published a fascinating article in Nature on the limits of
redwood height).

I then met Sillett at a canopy conference in Florida and through Steve
met BVP during an expedition to Australia which I funded using a
National Geographic Grant back in 2002 (a "canopy trek" of 5 days,
moving tree-to-tree through the beautiful Wallaby Creek canopy in
Victoria). It was on that expedition that BVP introduced us to Brett
Mifsud of Australia and his tree climbing partner Tom Greenwood. It was
Brett who told BVP about Wallaby Creek.

Then, on a recent trip to Borneo I heard of a new conservation area
called Imbak Canyon Conservation Area in Sabah. Sillett and I had
visited the older and better known Danum Valley Conservation Area
together in 2002 and found (and climbed) several large trees, including
a 79.5 m Shorea gibbosa, a 75.0 m Koompassia excelsa, and a 72.8 m
Parashorea malaanonan. In fact we climbed all these at Danum in 2002:
79.5 Dipterocarpaceae Shorea gibbosa
75.0 Leguminosae          Koompassia excelsa
72.8 Dipterocarpaceae Parashorea malaanonan
66.0 Dipterocarpaceae Shorea leprosula
63.0 Dipterocarpaceae Shorea johorensis
61.9 Meliaceae                 Azadriachta excelsa
59.2 Dipterocarpaceae Parashorea tomentella
59.2 Dipterocarpaceae Shorea parvifolia
52.6 Anacardiaceae         Dracontomelon costatum
40.8 Leguminosae         Dialium indum
Rucker index: 63.0 m or 206.9 feet for an area of less than 5 ha.

We (Sillett and I) didn't find all the tallest individuals of all
species in the area -- we were actually just looking for a good canopy
trek spot. Indeed, all but the big S. gibbosa are in a ~150 m by ~50 m
sample plot (the gibbosa is about 0.25 km away). Basically, it appears
that in the tropics as elsewhere, when you're in the big trees, they're
all pretty big, and it just so happens that every tree in a small patch
seems to be a different species (not completely, but it's crazy the
diversity, really crazy).

Now I'm giving you these Danum numbers because they are published and
it's a bit of history leading up to the latest expedition, the one with
*very* tall hardwoods.

Roman
Dipterocarps    Roman Dial
   Sep 26, 2005 22:25 PDT 

Mike,

Sulewesi and New Guinea have fewer Dipterocarps and I have not heard of
really tall trees growing there, although your question is an excellent
one.

As for Boreno's Dipterocarps, remember that these tropical hardwoods
grow tallest in old, primary forests. The tallest Australian Eucalypts
(the big regnans at 80-90+ m) are not growing in ancient forests (those
with tree-scale disturbances primarily), so much as mature forests that
are actually getting shorter as they get older (and forests intitaed by
disturbances bigger than the stand level). Eucalypts are more like
cottonwoods or Douglas fir -- fast growing, early successional and
light demanding species. These tall Dipterocarp species live in the
understory until given the opportunity of a light gap and then grow
tall. They are very shade tolerent, like hemlocks. They also produce big
heavy seeds that fall near the parent and sprout almost immediately in
the shade of the parent. They mast with flowering that seems to be
triggered by EL Nino events.

I find the Dipeterocarp forests fascinating, like a fantasy version of
the eastern hardwood forests I roamed as a kid. The forest floor has a
surprisingly thick cover of fallen brown and crunchy leaves (like the
eastern deciduous) and few palms (Costa Rica and the Amazon and all the
forests in between have lots of palms). It's hot and noisy with sounds
to my ear more like the deciduous forests of the east than the tropics
of central and south America.

Roman
Imbak and Tawau    Roman Dial
   Sep 26, 2005 22:33 PDT 

Bob,

As denizens of the cool NW, BVP and Steve Sillett are not hot and humid
weather people, clearly, so I invited the two Australians, Tom and
Brett, to go to Imbak in search of tall trees. The idea was to find
really tall trees and encourage more stringent protection of the Imbak
Conservation Area (which could still be logged), similar to what
happened in the early 1960's when Nat Geo sponsored exploration of the
area that became Redwoods NP in CA. A noble cause for some good tree
hunting and climbing.

So we spent a week in Imbak, flying in by helicopter and hiring porters
to carry our food. A grand adventure....Unfortunately the tallest trees
in Borneo where not there in Imbak, although the buttreses were big,
beautiful, and numerous. The rucker Index was 70.7 m or 231.96 feet at
Imbak, pretty good for an area sampled that was 675 hectares. Indeed all
but the Koompassia ( on most Borneo Ruckers) were found in a 54 hectare
area.

After Imbak we went 100 km east to Tawau to check the reputed tallest
Koompassia of all, one whose label at its base in the private palm oil
plantation said 90 m -- alas as everyone who measures tall trees knows,
the true height was less -- far less, by 8 m.

The tallest trees we found less than 2 km away in Tawau Hill Park, a
27,000 hectare Sabah State Park that was established in a sea of oil and
cocao plantations to protect the water supply there. Most of it has been
selectively logged, but we found a small 1 or 2 hectare patch with 5
trees of four different species that each reached over 80 m. We think
there is a 90 m tree in there and **know** there's one very close to
that:)

Anyway 70-80 m Koompassias are quite common in the surrounding palm oil
plantations, standing as giant, white ghosts of the former glory of
Dipterocarp lowland tropical rainforests there. They were spared the saw
becasue their high silica content dulls milling blades, they are a
favorite nesting site of the giant Asian honey bee (Apis dorsata, who
nests there because Malaysian sun bears and other climbing bee-eaters
can't climb the smooth, hard bark, although people pound pegs into the
trunk and climb rattan ladders to collect honey), and the locals feel
that Koompassia trees are favored haunts of forest spirits.

Tawau has very tall trees and is known to historically have had the
tallest trees due to the basalt soils there, which are very rare for
Borneo. These soils make Tawau the richest palm oil producing region in
Sabah, the state which is the richest oil palm producer in Malaysia,
which is apparently the best oil palm producing country in the world.

The main nuisance, however, are the very active land leeches. Even now,
week-old bites itch, my socks are blood stained, and I can feel the
disgust of discovery as red blood pours down my leg.

Roman
Impulse vs tape drop in Borneo    Roman Dial
   Sep 26, 2005 22:39 PDT 

Will,

The Implse 200 LR was generally within 1 meter of the tape drop
measures. The tape drop measures were done by Tom Greenwood, who is an
international caliber competitive tree climber. The guy regularly
climbed to within 1-2 meters of the top! Now these Impulse 200 LR
measures were usually made by Brett, who's been doing big tree measures
for like 10 years (albeit usually with a Bushnell, a clinometer and a
calculator -- the humidity hurt his Bushnell). he took great pride in
estimating his tree heights as a conservative X+. He'd say "yep 82 plus"
using the laser and eyeballing midpoint of ground, then Tom would climb
and drop the tape and after adding the small bit at the top the number
would come out like 82.4 m. This happened all the time. We climbed 14
trees on our 14 day expedition (all over 65 m) and Brett was in all
cases but one (-2.7 m off) within 1.99 m and within 0.99 m for at least
2/3. In essence, Tom checked Brett's measures (underestimates when
lianas and woods tangled the view) and changed Brett's "plus" to a
point. So, to answer you question, Will, the Impulse in the hands of an
experienced user gives measures with 95% confidence intervals of 2 m (or
6 feet), and generally underestimate the true height by around 1 meter.

From my experience, the best pairing is a big tree hunter and a big tree
climber. I'd be interested to know if you folks back East have a
BVP-Sillett or Mifsud-Greenwood pairing?

Nevertheless, I think it’s very important for the tall trees to be
climbed as it gives the most precise and accurate measure of the tree
height and more importantly the best view, looking down at the world
below after the pleasure of getting over difficult parts of the trunks
and forks.

Roman
RE: Dipterocarps    Robert Leverett
   Sep 27, 2005 05:49 PDT 

Roman,

   Utterly fascinating. I am alway riveted to the tantalizing scenes
from the world's super tall tropical and temperate forests. I got
glimpses of the great forests in Southeast Asia in the late 1960s and
early 1970s, under very unpleasant circumstances. By contrast, I was
able to explore some of the great forests of Taiwan under very happy
circumstances and have an aging collection of slides that BVP suggested
I get scanned in for cleanup. I do intend to do that.

   Prior to BVP's report, I doubt that any of us knew what to expect
from the tropical rainforests, e.g. which were the tallest. When BVP
gave us the run down that you mentioned, Borneo became fixed in my mind
and it has stayed there ever since. In fact, Australia, Oceania, and
Central Africa have stayed in my thoughts.

    We have always been blessed with BVP's membership in and support of
ENTS. We all look to Bob to set the level of the bar for us. Will Blozan
and I were especially gratified when he extended the Rucker indexing
system to the world stage. Our old friend Colby Rucker would have never
imagined his name extended to include so much geography and such great
trees. However, Roman, we now welcome you with great enthusiasm. We hope
you will make ENTS an internet home, and obviously, your world-class
climbing friends as well. As you may have seen from prior posts, ENTS
has lots going on, but we continuously search for new pastures. Apparent
to any who read our postings, a core group of us in ENTS are numerically
driven. Some, foremost BVP, Will Blozan, Michael Davie, and Ed Coyle
climb, and in so doing, combine their profession with science,
avocation, and sport. With full recognition that you probably keep a
wildly busy schedule, we hope you will consider ENTS a place to share
some of your experiences and to provide summary data when you can on
these fabulous places that most of us will only see in the photographic
images that those such as yourself take.

    We all hope you will consider ENTS as at least one of your
cyberspace tree homes. Hey, any interest in starting TNTS (tents),
Tropical Native Tree Society as a partner of ENTS?

    Man, I have more questions to ask you than I have brains to absorb
the answers. So, I will proceed cautiously. My first is what makes a
Dipterocarp a Dipterocarp? Guess I'm in love with that name. I can
imagine a Brontosaurus-like dinosaur nibbling on its leaves. Climbing
into the canopy of a old growth rainforest in Borneo must generate
inside one primeval feelings, feelings that can only be experienced.
WOW!

Bob