Hi, I had belonged to the list back in the Topica days and before, although eventually kept missing half the messages and became too busy with school and dropped out of sight for a while. (not that I had posted too much, mostly lurked)
I've pretty much always been impressed by big trees. I started doing a few ENTs-like things on my own starting around the late 80's. Originally, I had figured that anything in the East, where logging was not a big business (at least as it seemed to someone born and raised in NJ during the very late 20th century), that was still standing had always stood there. I figured that differences from tract to tract, which had always been obvious to me, were just due to the particular nature of the soil and climate in each little microlocation. Of course I was comically wrong, but I had never imagine it could've been otherwise. I saw no logging going on anywhere near where I grew up and I couldn't comprehend the fact that man had actual gone over and cut practically every acre across the entire eastern half of the US. When I found out the truth I was shocked and dismayed, particularly since popular accounts said it was ALL gone aside from the in the Smoky Mountains and 3 or 4 additional small tracts. Outside of the Smoky Mountains and less than a handful of small tracts it was said that it was said to be a true fool's errand to hunt for any old-growth. Thankfully this was entirely invalid advice (that said as a percentage of forestland what remains in anything close to original conditions is just a few specks on a map so in the larger scale sense it was correct). When I first began looking into it I came across a tremendous amount of invalid information (one of the most ironic bits is all the stuff I read about how the Adirondacks had been 100% cut over and were perhaps some of the scrubbiest, most abused forest in the East! Of course we all know they have the MOST old-growth of all in the East. But I avoided traveling to the region for quite a few years based on a few way off-base reports in general nature books and guides. I had thought of them as wonderful for scale but of very trashy quality! Thankfully as I dug more and more I found this to be as wrong as could be. I think it was a few of Barbara McMartins hiking guides that first alerted me to how greatly mislead I had been. And certainly all of the ENTs info and the old-growth clearinghouse pblications were simply a treasure trove when I came across them.). Interestingly I found that both now (as well as historically), forest service/loggers/land managers are sometimes the worst sources to go to if one wants to find out about potential old-growth. In far too many cases they have either heard so much about how nothing is left that they are overly hesistant to label anything as old-growth even when it really seems to be teh case or more disturbingly are new and have been indoctrinated by their superiors or actually have deep and minute detail about all sorts of 'non-existant' old-growth tracts, often far more than any old-growth lovers, but kept it hush-hush or downplayed value/age/etc. for fear of public outcry (or competitors moving in on their targets). Just look at historical records and seeing where salvage claims were INSTANTLY filed after the great 1950 storm in the adirondacks or see a logging road mysteriously weave deep into a national forest to a certain spot, etc. (clearly many knew all about remnant, highly 'merchantable' tracts). Or say a forest service guy sweating as he tries with a straight face to label a 250 year old tree as being only 50 years old at best.... Anyway, digging into old records, as Barbara McMartin did when trying to find out more about the Adirondacks does seem to be quite fruitful though. Hunting for old newspaper articles and looking through old books can also turn up finds. There may still be quite a lot of small tracts to be found that way alone I think. Publications by the Eastern Old-Growth Clearinghouse have brought much of the disparate info together but I think there are still quite a few sites out there that have not yet been brought into the main old-growth site list that have already been written about and discovered. For instance the Blanton Forest discovery in Kentucky seems to be considered a relatively recent event and yet it was already mentioned in a used book I bought back in the 1980's (i forget when the book was published maybe in the 50's?). Just the other day, in fact, I did some searching of some old geological reports of NJ from the late 1800's and noted a few interesting things. One was talk of some still standing timber in the Sourlands. Next I did some googling and came across some musician who referred to the Sourlands where he grew up as the greatest old- growth tract in NJ. I was a bit dubious, of course, since if it was that large, why no mention in any of the old-growth lists for NJ. Then after more tracking I came across a recent blog by an old-growth enthusiast living in the area. And was stunned to find a photo of a GIGANTIC tulip tree having ancient looking bark, tall, straight, forest grown nestled in among other giant looking trees (mostly said to NOT be tulips) in the distance! I think there will be a new ancient forest to add to the clearinghouse list for NJ. No solid info given on size, seems like it must be at least 8 acres and potentially hundreds of acres from what i can put together just lookign at old maps and recent aerials (and surrounded by hundreds and hundreds of buffer second growth). Later than night I found a regional study which mentioned some very mature forest areas on the mountain top but said they had to be second growth due to past history of NJ logging. But this guy's info has me thinking they must be wrong, at least about select patches of the area. The blogger also said he found some records implying that anything over a certain age would likely have to have been never cut if it still existed and the age of that tulip simply has to be well older than that necessarily age. I also found some other interesting finds, see next message. -Larry -- Eastern Native Tree Society http://www.nativetreesociety.org Send email to [email protected] Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/entstrees?hl=en To unsubscribe send email to [email protected]
