Champion Trees

[mdvaden]

Do like Mario does and put a gal in the picture to better show the scale of the tree.

Or if you just don't happen to have a fine looking girl in a red dress handy, a scruffy climber.

Stig ... here's both in one photo.

World's tallest known hemlock "Tsunami" with a relatively fine looking girl, who also happens to be a scruffy climber. She'd probably look fine in a dress or jeans & jacket.

Tsunami was found the day after the 2011 Japan Earthquake launched the tsunami at the redwood coast. It's about 274 feet tall now, in Prairie Creek. Not as tall at those redwoods, but taller than every redwood in Muir Woods National Monument.

 

[stig]

WOW!
And that is to both the tree and the gal.

I was, of course, thinking of the picture behind my dining table with ( Shit, I forgot her name) and Lost Monarch.

I totally love that one.
Countless people have looked at it since I bought it from you, and it is always fun to see that little start they give, when they spot the girl, and everything falls into perspective.

Be a buddy and post it for Forestkeepers.

 

[rico]

That is one tall, beautiful Hemlock.
Climbed, topped, and fell some pretty big/tall Hemlocks in Southeast Alaska back in the day, but nothing that tall.
Your photos continue to amaze me. Keep em' coming!

 

[Burnham]

 

[RegC]

Had a trip out to the red creek fir today. Supposedly the biggest Doug fir in the world. Not the tallest, mind. Long drive, and hard to find, but worth it when you get there.

 

[MasterBlaster]

Wow.

WOW!!!

 

[dstimber]

👍 beautiful place you got to visit Reg.

 

[stig]

Damned, reg.

You got that scruffy climber thing that I mentioned down to a T.

Hell of an impressive tree.

I just took a look in my library.
12,320 cubic feet.
Nowhere near the tallest, though : 73 meters/ 242 feet. Mainly because the top has been blown out several times.

Do you have Robert Van Pelts : Forest giants of the Pacific coast?

I can really recommend that one.along with Wendell D. Flint's: To find the biggest tree.

The last one is only about Sequoias and a few Redwoods, and is mostly of interest to " Effing rec climbers" like me

 

[rico]

Beautiful Fir and terrain Reg! ,
Looking at clear-cuts, and knowing that I participated in that shit makes my heart hurt nowadays.

 

[RegC]

Damned, reg.

You got that scruffy climber thing that I mentioned down to a T.

Hell of an impressive tree.

I just took a look in my library.
12,320 cubic feet.
Nowhere near the tallest, though : 73 meters/ 242 feet. Mainly because the top has been blown out several times.

Do you have Robert Van Pelts : Forest giants of the Pacific coast?

I can really recommend that one.along with Wendell D. Flint's: To find the biggest tree.

The last one is only about Sequoias and a few Redwoods, and is mostly of interest to " Effing rec climbers" like me

No I havent read it Stig. Theres nothing wrong with Rec climbing. I just personally couldn't find the enthusiasm to climb more trees on my days off, for free. I got some video from the tree and journey, but I wont have it up until next week. Lots of big stuff around that part of the island, Hemlock, Spruce, Fir and Cedar. Easy to believe that the tallest of the species is out somewhere waiting to be found. If you had the means and time to access and explore.

 

[rico]

Here's the largest Fir on my parcel. Tapes out at 8 ft DBH on the button. Climbed it once a while back and it measure a scosh over 240 ft. First limb is at 135-140 ft, and is a small tree (40-42" diameter ). Big old Fir with a nasty head-lean. I love this tree!

 

[RegC]

Good one Eric. Glad to see its not sitting horizontal

 

[gf beranek]

Douglas fir. All one tree. Better than 7 foot on the butt. Along the Neeland road, just south of Lone Star Junction. Not a mill-able log in it, but she's a real beauty.

 

[MasterBlaster]

I just personally couldn't find the enthusiasm to climb more trees on my days off, for free.

I'm with you on that, Reg. Never understood a pro climber rec climbing on their days off!

 

[Burnham]

Beautiful Fir and terrain Reg! ,
Looking at clear-cuts, and knowing that I participated in that shit makes my heart hurt nowadays.

Now that sentiment right there, I don't get, Erico.

When I look at a beautifully growing reforested clearcut that I was given responsibility for after it was harvested, took sample plots on slash-ridden and often steep as shit western Cascade Mountain slopes to establish plantability and need or not for site prep, managed said need under FS crew or contract, then planned for and acquired appropriate planting stock, then set up a plan for FS planting crew or contract for a planting crew, and ensured that their work was of the necessary quality, started work hours before daylight to load up planting stock and drive up into the deep woods to meet said planting crews, monitored acre after acre the planting, then followed up with stocking survival plots acre after acre, then arranged any needed replants to account for too high mortality, then followed every other year with stocking surveys to keep track of that unit's progress until the new stand was 5 years established, then 6-8-10 years on took acre upon acre of stand exam surveys, let and administered contracts to provide pre-commercial thinning, acre after acre again...

I find those young stands of trees absolutely beautiful.

Remember...there is nowhere else on this green planet that is better suited for growing trees. If we don't do it right here, then we will ship our insaitiable appetite for timber off to some much less well-off part of the world that has much poorer growing conditions and lacks realistically enforced laws requiring reforestation.

That is a much greater crime against our planet than those clearcuts pictured above your post, Eric...and far more damaging "participation in that shit", imo.

And also worth every penny you paid for this opinion...I get that .

 

[DMc]

Nice post, Burnham, and I agree.

 

[rico]

Were gonna have to agree to disagree on this one Burnham. I simply don't agree with clear-cutting practices.
I have personally worked on old growth clear-cut projects from start to finish. I have seen the before and after, and the utter devastation to the flora & fauna, wild life, watershed, etc. Eco- systems forever changed that will never return. Ever! Something I cannot be proud to have participated in.
I have also worked on well managed select-cut project like we practice here in California. When done right you have beautiful, healthy forests left, with vital and rare plants and animals still intact. We have many plants/animals around here that don't exist anywhere else in the world. That would all end very quickly with a clear-cut.
A friend of mine runs one of the bigger outfits around here and the timber they are harvesting is averaging over 50" DBH. That is a well managed forest with its sensitive eco-system left largely intact. 2-3 years later and you can barely tell it was logged. That sounds good to me.

 

[DMc]

Damn, a great post also, Eric. An entirely different concept of harvesting and conserving that should be used whenever possible

 

[stig]

Reg, you posted a video where you were going up a large tree and sais something like it made you feel like a f..... rec climber.
That totally cracked me up, and has stayed with me ever since.
I think I replied back then, telling you about the fun to be had in climbing Sequoias/ Redwoods with a few good buddys.

 

[stig]

Burnham, we've been down this road before.

My problem with the way forests were treated in the PNW is that there were virtually no regulations.
As an emerging nation, you let most of it be bought up by a bunch of lumber barons like Weyerhauser, who used the homestead act and a lot of cheaply bought " homesteaders" as their stooges.

If you look at the Redwoods, 96% of the old growth forest was logged off, and the only reason you didn't end up like New Zealand ( They have about a handfull of the old Kauris left) was that a bunch of private citicens got together and bough up some of the groves.

It may just be the socialist in me, but I see all that logged off land as a country being raped of one of it's biggest assets, so a few assholes could get rich, quickly.

Not one of them looked to the future, it was all about fast profit.

So while I too enjoy looking at a well maintained second, third or in our case 315th growth( I just made that number up) forest, it still pains me that you managed to do away with so much of your original forest in so few generations ( Notice how I avoided the dread word, Old growth).

Untill recently, forest management the the Western US was alike to mining.
Go at it till there is no more.

Why not. " If you've seen one Redwood, you've seen them all".
Guess you know where that one comes from.

As for my use of the word recently, as late as in 1987 your former employer got the great idea that while the Sequoias were protected, there was no problem in clear cutting al the " whitewood" between them, so they let the largest Sequoia grove, Black mountain grove, be clearcut, leaving only the Sequoias.

The Sierra club put a stop to that, proving yet again that if it wasn't for private individuals, there would not be much of the original forest in the Western US left.







For a guy with a 40 year career in logging, I do pretty well at sounding like a leaf licker, don't I?

 

[rico]

Burnham, we've been down this road before.

My problem with the way forests were treated in the PNW is that there were virtually no regulations.
As an emerging nation, you let most of it be bought up by a bunch of lumber barons like Weyerhauser, who used the homestead act and a lot of cheaply bought " homesteaders" as their stooges.

If you look at the Redwoods, 96% of the old growth forest was logged off, and the only reason you didn't end up like New Zealand ( They have about a handfull of the old Kauris left) was that a bunch of private citicens got together and bough up some of the groves.

It may just be the socialist in me, but I see all that logged off land as a country being raped of one of it's biggest assets, so a few assholes could get rich, quickly.

Not one of them looked to the future, it was all about fast profit.

So while I too enjoy looking at a well maintained second, third or in our case 315th ( I just made that number up) forest, it still pains me that you managed to do away with so much of your original forest in so few generations ( Notice how I avoided the dread word, Old growth).

Untill recently, forest management the the Western US was alike to mining.
Go at it till there is no more.

Why not. " If you've seen one Redwood, you've seen them all".
Guess you know where that one comes from.

As for my use of the word recently, as late as in 1987 your former employer got the great idea that while the Sequoias were protected, there was no problem in clear cutting al the " whitewood" between them, so they let the largest Sequoia grove, Black mountain grove, be clearcut, leaving only the Sequoias.

The Sierra club put a stop to that, proving yet again that if it wasn't for private individuals, there would not be much of the original forest in the Western US left.







For a guy with a 40 year career in logging, I do pretty well at sounding like a leaf licker, don't I?

Very nice Stig.

 

[stig]

Thanks Eric.

Given enough time, we might grow to like each other

BTW, you just pissed Butch off no end , by quoting the last post.

 

[rico]

Butch is just gonna have to get in line, as there are a bunch of folks who are already angry with me.

 

[RegC]

Beautiful Fir and terrain Reg! ,
Looking at clear-cuts, and knowing that I participated in that shit makes my heart hurt nowadays.

Im not dead against it Eric....so long as it proportionate, and sustainable. Unfortunately, not so much the case where that pic was taken. Huge areas of clearcuts, 10 maybe 20 years old. Looks like a bombs gone off. Nothings grown back, nor had been re planted. Just abandoned. You got to really worship money to do that kind of thing to what is essentially your home.

 

[cory]

It may just be the socialist in me, but I see all that logged off land as a country being raped of one of it's biggest assets, so a few assholes could get rich, quickly.

Not one of them looked to the future, it was all about fast profit.

,,,The Sierra club put a stop to that, proving yet again that if it wasn't for private individuals, there would not be much of the original forest in the Western US left.

Looking at clear-cuts, and knowing that I participated in that shit makes my heart hurt nowadays.

Were gonna have to agree to disagree on this one Burnham. I simply don't agree with clear-cutting practices.
I have personally worked on old growth clear-cut projects from start to finish. I have seen the before and after, and the utter devastation to the flora & fauna, wild life, watershed, etc. Eco- systems forever changed that will never return. Ever! Something I cannot be proud to have participated in.
I have also worked on well managed select-cut project like we practice here in California. When done right you have beautiful, healthy forests left, with vital and rare plants and animals still intact. We have many plants/animals around here that don't exist anywhere else in the world. That would all end very quickly with a clear-cut.
A friend of mine runs one of the bigger outfits around here and the timber they are harvesting is averaging over 50" DBH. That is a well managed forest with its sensitive eco-system left largely intact. 2-3 years later and you can barely tell it was logged. That sounds good to me.

Im not dead against it Eric....so long as it proportionate, and sustainable. Unfortunately, not so much the case where that pic was taken. Huge areas of clearcuts, 10 maybe 20 years old. Looks like a bombs gone off. Nothings grown back, nor had been re planted. Just abandoned. You got to really worship money to do that kind of thing to what is essentially your home.

So well said Stig, Eric, and Reg.