You have been very busy since we've moved to Google! I don't think that i've said that much since joining way back in Topica times. Beth
Sent from my iPhone On Dec 30, 2009, at 22:41, Dinomys4 <[email protected]> wrote: apologies for grammar, spelling, rambling nature, fomratting (lack thereof) just trying to hack this out there as fast as I can, tired, will take a long time as it is even being sloppy, sorry already listed in the Old Growth in the East or Ancient Forest of the Northeast as virgin, old-growth or older second growth (VMT; with some trees over 200 years old, but clearer signs of past selective or even clear-cutting than the others) are: 1. Tillman Ravine Natural Area - VMT 2. parts of Bull's Island 3. Valhalla Hemlock Glen 4. part of Greenbrook Sanctuary 5. one edge of Laurel Pond 6. Delaware Water Gap cliffside scrub OG 7. part of Bear Swamp West 8. parts of Bear Swamp East 9. Mettler's Woods 10. isolated patches in Great Cedar Swamp section of Cape May National Wildlife Refuge 11. Dryden Kuser State Natural Area possilble sections of old-growth AWC 12. Frank G. Heylar Woods 13. MacArthur/Saddler's Woods 14. a part of Jockey Hollow - VMT 15. Jenkins Woods possible additions (all need to be verified, again none of these are at all verified): 16. there are small rises in the eastern half of the Great Swamp some of which are said to have never been logged and have 60" beeches and some old oaks, semi-recently they built a road and a couple houses through one of the larger and most accessible patches which fell outside park boundaries although more trees than not are still standing there since they didnt build onto any of the island arms and kept it a narrow little build (development report mentioned gigantic old beech many feet thick); not really traditional forest but there may be quite a few very tiny patches of virgin timber rising up from the water in very, very tiny acreages, not sure how many, some rises are so small that the trees have a "wolf tree" growth form, only natural in this case; i haven't really looked into this much myself but have found a number of varied sources from books, pamphelts, staff, environmental impact reviews mentioning ancient beeches mixed with some oaks to be found on select rises throughout the eastern part of the park; this has so many sources that it almost couldbe considered verified i think 17. Penn Swamp section of Wharton State Forest - found an old newspaper article (no date on the scan but the layout matched what the paper used in the 70's and very early 80's I think) where some state forester was all upset this his 'crop' of ancient white cedars in a remnant old-growth patch had been spiked by some tree lovers to prevent his logging the tract that summer, he said the trees were now useless and the logging plans had to be abandonded forever and that it was a great loss that such great trees would now soon rot and die and the forest could now never recover and be healthy.... typical forest service talk.... interesting how the 'overmature' adirodnack parcels said ready to rot to forest destruciton in the adirondakcs in 1900 are still 100 years later the best looking tracts! funny how forest ever grew for thousands of years before we came and cut....; no idea about the acreage; no idea whether the trres were merely older than the rest of the heavily logged over region but not even approaching real old- growth or really are; the area has mosrtly poor soild and a major history of logging and fires so if someone saw trees even 80 years old they might mistake them for old-growth, then again maybe this is one of the less than handful remaining AWC old-growth swamps....; whatever the case it sounds like there is no way they could've logged it in the time since the article due to the spikes; no clue about acreage 18. Thompson Park, Lincroft, NJ - just found this park listed as containing OG forest, once part of a famous horsebreeding estate, historical photos said to show certain parts of forest that were old way back then as remaining continuously forested since then, i didn't visit it yet, a quick eyeball look at the map of the tract and I quickly and sloppily estimate about 15-30acres of OG??? (side note, also in this general region, it looks to me like there might have been a little old-growth where they paved over for the NJ Garden State Performance Arena, just driving past the other day I thought I saw some very old looking trees standing here and there around the edges of the parking lot and vaguely seem to recall some fight over why do we put an arts arena on this patch of trees fight a long time back, but it's hard to be sure from a 65mph driveby and looking off into the distance) 19. Rutgers Natural Area Piscataway/Edison/Highland Park, NJ - one nature study in the 1980's called it a marvelous old-growth forest in parts; another report say it was fully logged, but long ago and now has many 200 year old trees with a few perhaps older; said to have been army ownded at various points in time and behind the old berms the woods were generally never much bothered and only ever selectively cut at times none recent; a few photos made it appear to have some promise, at the very least as a very old secondary growth forest; another report said it was the best old forest in central NJ (NOTE this is NOT the Heylar Woods Tract but one about three miles northwest of that); looks like about 400 acres but i think maybe only half or so are supposed to be the older part not sure at all; my guess is it will turn out to be like the Jockey Hollow class tract in how you characterize it (not in terms of tree species though!) 20. Sourlands Mountain region - old forestry reports hinted at potential for some remaining old-growth so I did some digging and found a musician who called it the largest old-growth forest in NJ, a very vague claim in terms of any science behind it that also seemed to hint at a truly impossible amount of OG so wasn't quite sure what to make of it but it got my attention so I kept digging even more and found a forest enthusiast mention the region on his blog, he lives in the area, he says he feels that some parts of the mountain may be virgin timber in addition to extensive areas of older second growth and young second growth, one of his photos appeared to show a simply STUNNING patch of ancient forest, a HUGE, forest straight, ancient barked tulip with what are said to be some giant forest straight oaks and other species surrounding it, a tulip that size with that sort of bark on a NJ mountain top would seem to me to have to be WAY over 200 years old, WAY over, at least in my part of NJ (granted a harsher, colder, rockier part) it sure would be. I mean a truly stunning looking photo! Made me almost start thinking of Joyce Kilmer in NC and not NJ! He appeared to be exceptionally sophisticated in his knowledgable about forests. Shortly after, I found a study report for the region that mentioned some very old second growth forests but it said that the area had a cut late 1800's. However, the trees in the photo were clearly way older than that. The blogger said he found 1800's maps showing that trees older than 150 or so (? i forget the exact number) should be original timber and that the trees here seemed like they had to be old enough to have made it back to the pre-any logging era. I wonder if the region study didnt find the old-growth but simply call it all old second growth because they had been taught that no old-growth can remain in NJ? I simply can't believe the patch in that photo could be second growth, even old second growth; acreage unknown; there seems to be at the very least one patch of virgin timber at least 5 acres in size and there is the potential for maybe as much as a few hundred acres of OG or at least borderline OG/second growth??? surrounded by many hundreds of acres of old second growth ranging down to pole timber. Anyway I'm very excited by this! Even if almost of all of it does turn out to be just a few older second growth patches in mostly younger forest i am all but convinced there is at least one tiny patch of true old-growth with monster class trees and have some legitimate hope there may even be dozens of acres of old- growth maybe even a couple hundred? I believe that there are still quite a few private tracts under intense development pressure :( here though! Once I'm in condition to get out there again I can look into it more and I will try to get more information from the discoveror too. 21. West Orange tract - apparently Seton Hall prep paved over 25 acres of old-growth or old second growth and is fighting to pave over the remaining 17 acres for another 3 baseball fields (900 student school, seems like a LOT of fields). If this is all true, pretty disgusting, OG is so ridiculously rare! and not like NJ doesn't have a million ballfields and developments! Apparently they have been very hard nosed and rejected all pleas, even from the Kennedys and have even cut down acreage illegally without building permit approval. some photos make some trees, if maybe not all, look a bit field grown. the Seton Hall provided photos though are useless they make it look like a treeless mudpit and are most misleading for sure. 22. Loantaka Brook OG 2 - heard some claims that in addition to the Loantaka Brook OG mentioned in the Ancient Forest guide that there are one or two additional patches of similar or larger acreage about a mile and half to the south; no idea if they are valid or not; perhaps 15-80 acres total??? 23. Scherman Hoff tract - heard some claims that they have a small acreage of 200-300 year old trees; no idea acreage or how likely to pan out 24. Hackensack River - i saw a photo in someone's portforlio labelled "OG?" it was said to have been taken somewhere in the hackensack river area somewhere vaguely near River Vale; in one photo was a pretty large lookign tulip in another were four large looking tulips; they didnt have 400-500 year old looked bark but they did look pretty old in my area i would think 250 years but maybe they grow better in that soil and could be as young as 150?? no idea if it was just a handful of old trees or an actual forest patch 25. Palisades - aside from Greenbrook mentioned above the 1895 study said the best timber in NJ was on top of the palisades from Huyler Landing to Edgwater; they said it was already very, very old even then, they said they feared it would soon all be developed; the palisades probably have quite a bit of very old second growth up and down in addition to the greenbrook sanctuary; of course the bottom part by edgewater is totaly gone, not even a tree left 26. Argonne Park Englewood, NJ - 1895 survey said a tiny virgin timber tract existed a mile west of Englewood, oddly enough in a sea of development the one open space in the region is exactly where they mentioned the virgin timber was and i see it is now called argonne park; is it VT? or did it get logged between 1895 and now? 27. NW Oradell Tract - the 1895 survery said a small tract of virgin timber was kept on a hill a mile and half northwest of Oradell, interesting enough right there are also the only areas from of development today, there are four green areas around there, are any of them the tract in question?? sadly the most promising positioned one seems to have been converted largely to a golf course some years ago; is there a small VT tract still here??? 28. Sparta Glenn - looked like possible OG hemlock to me i though they looked older than the Tillmann Ravine stuff perhaps; afraid to look again though as already 6 years ago it was almost all dead and fallen over, damn HWA!!!!!!!!!! disgusting a beautiful cool dark ravine now like a bare open dirt field!! 29. northeast of canistear hemlock tract - the largest tract of old- growth hemlock in NJ, have great fear they are dead now though 30. Dunfield Creek Delware Water Gap - i haven't been there for a while but i recall seeing what struck as me as very large old trees, even back before i knew anything about eastern old-growth when i was there as a little kid i recall being impressed by the trees; at the least some very prime old second growth; recently saw some newspaper article in PA calling it old-growth although I suspect it was probably an area that was once cut over fully but has grown back very well and for a long time, if the Jocky Hollow makes the list this rpobably should too (unless my memory is playing tricks on me) although probably not real old-growth 31. west pond hewitt beaufort - the 1895 study said that the beaufort mountain had had major logging and terrible fires on top of poor soils on the ridges and was some of the worst forest in the state but it also said that the deeper ravines and cuts into it had long been known to house the best remaining tracts of virgin forest in NJ in particular the west pond ravine; so the question is do any of the cuts and ravines still have VT??? The west pond ravine appears to have zero parking access and perhaps zero trail access and appears as if it would've be nasty to log but otoh it has been under care of the state forest at times and they are the people who do cut a lot more than the park people; 2.5 mile long ravine with VT??? or did someone cut it over since 1895??? are the other ravines uncut in spots???? 32. Farny/Splitrock Bumps tract - one report implies a single remanant OG tree, other reports imply an actual forest nobody mentions acreage, from what I know it could be anywhere from 1 tree to 400 acres as possible extremes a little hard to tell from satellite maps looks like it might be 8-120 acres as a more reasonable guess if it is a forest remnant; the area has a few thousand acres of continguous forest; i need to get in there; i have seen a photo someone took of one tree in there (straight up so you can't really tell anything about its' neighbors, the tree is OG for sure, it is red oak, it is >48"dbh) 33. Wawayanda Hemlcok Ravine - most reports refer to it as second growth but a couple call it OG; i have no idea; one recent report calls it more than half dead; damn HWA!!!! formerly 34. The Bear Stearns Desecration - they were said to have illegally filled in wetlands and then gotten approval for a new HQ and parking lot on the wetland, they refused all pleas to not put the parking lot over the old-growth forest at the least (60" diameter trees) they refused to do even the slightest thing to help and seemed to relish plowing the trees over and were very obnoxious, at the time they had hundreds of millions of dollars to spare, they flaunted the destruction and their cash flow, they acted the same way on wall street and with their investments and.... crashed and burned out of business the other year during the great fallout --------------- Additional possibilites: Bernardsville - some real estate site mentioned some new houses near the Bernardsville old-growth forest patch, whatever that is, may have merit, but very well may not, many real estate sites now appear to brag about old-growth in many cases at least they jsut mean 70-80 year old shade trees; but it is not impossible that this region could have a remnant patch it had some big old estates Tabor to Parsipanny tract road - in 1895 geo survery of NJ they said the road from Tabor to Parsipanny had some of the oldest remaining forest in the region with the woodlots having been uncut (at that time) for 100-150 years, this would mean 215-265 year old second growth or even some old-growth patches, however these region saw incredibly heavy housing development in the 50's-00's so I have not a lot of faith it remains, although a quick peek at delomre map shows a single remnant 100 acre area colored green still, anyway a longshot with such intense development in that area.... although not far off that line i do vaguelt recall seeing a patch that looked rather old indeed when i once drove around some roads in there in the early 90's so maybe there could be a few 5-10 acre patches of 250 year old stuff? Oradell Reservoir - i note a few patches of woods still left around it and an 1895 report caliming that near Haworth there were some nice trees including 84" diameter chestnuts; of course chestnuts are dead regardless but maybe there could be a few nice trees in the area still?? not too likely but you never know Beach Glenn to Meriden, Rockaway - it said that in 1895 this tract had areas with 36" trees, that would make for some really old forest today, my favorite dirt road went near there but got ruined and developed in the 90's in the backyard of a few houses i thought i could make out some very large trees back in there on the steep hill that goes down to the swamp; between the two cliff knobs of wildcat ridge it looks like some big trees on the steeps; probably no OG but maybe some 150-200 year old patches in the area?? ravine 2 miles north of norvin green - some nice big old trees in there ----------------- Some nice second growth forests: western wildcat ridge tract/wml (i.e. where i grew up :) ) - the area has some parcels of forest that are at least 150 years old with pit and mound, large roots, large spicebush understory (although deer have decimated the lower forest levels the past 15 years), 1895 report had the area listed as in one of the better forested regions of the highlands at that time with forests often 60 years old in the region (at the time); a small ironwood in one of the older looking patches fell over and was examined in the 1990's it's count would give the forest at least 150 years ago now, it was one of the smaller trees in the patch that said there is no saying that the larger trees are any older and the forest is probably not a remant OG woodlot/sugarbush probably just some nice 150 year old or so second growth, lots of sugar maples, a tulip or two, a few beech, two or three oak species, a few white ash, a few yellow-birch (i.e. a rich northern hardwood forest) bottom end of river out of Hacklebarney Park - some very nice tall pretty old second growth Mase Mountain region east of route 15 - areas with some nice older second growth including hemlock/tulip/maple; shockingly immediately east of 15 above the gully there in a guys backyard i saw that he had cut a couple trees at the boundary and although they did not look old it looked like 70-80 yeard old forest! i counted 160 rings! (five years ago) i was stunned it goes to show that forest may be much older than you think and that some of the guess at 150 could maybe then be 250??? just down into the ravine and on the other side the forest looked much bigger and older with some large hemlock too Buck Mountain North Kinnelon, NJ - sadly after all the work to save the farny highlands at the very last second before the highlands act was passed they let the guy retain and subdivide a 250acre or so worm that dug right into the heart and it greatly fragmented the region that had been famed as largest unfragmented tract in the entire region; it also snaked around a magical pond hidden by four surrounding peaks and some marvelous rock outcrops and decent forest, the single worst development to go up in all of northern nj in years i'd say, anyway before they got permission to sneak it in, i noticed they had put in a prelim road and i saw some trucks loaded up with trees that 160 rings on them (this was about 8 years ago) so somewhere in there there had been some what would now have been 170 year old second growth; there are still many hundreds of surrounded acres some may also have 170 year old forest southern tip Hamburg Mtn widllife refuge - in the ravines immediate to the north of route 23 in there you see some very large trees probably some nice 150-200 year old second growth?? Apshawa Tract Butler Reservoir North - said to have some of the nicest remaining northern hardwood forest in NJ Butler Reservoir South/Fayson Lakes - i only walked a few minutes but southern shore has some very large trees, some of the oldest looking second growth i've seen anywhere in the region, a few almost looked like they could be 250-300 years old, a quick peak at aerial map hinted at some more possibilits for northeastern shore; in some ways maybe i could have put this in the potential OG section although despite the huge size of many trees there did seem to be signs of very, very old work by man; trees were tall and not field type; branches mostly not until pretty high so they were somewhat forest- like and yet some seemed to have signs of some large branches much lower down at some point in the past; but yeah some pretty big and tall trees frelinghuysen arboreteum - first part of the woodland trails has some pretty tall second growth tulips a few parts of the forest look like they are well over a hundred years old, not a large forest Clinton Reservoir - just to the north along the stream for a couple miles was a nice hemlock/white pine forest, looked as old as the Tillman Ravine to me in some areas if not OG, damn adelgids are doing terrible damage though!!!! hemlocks seemed older than the pines i think since pines that old should be ridiculously large not merely reasonably big the road past echo lake ravine - looked like some nice tall stuff, probaby second growth of a good 150 years of age for sure half mile south of eastern tip of mt hope park - a tiny acreage of private land below the road with some nice big second growth probably 160-180 years old great piece meadows - said to have some pretty big timber in parts; a huge swampland; probably areas of 150 year old second growth, such a deep swampy area maybe some remant OG in there too??? ok tired of typing :) -- 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] -- 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]
