These trees are 200+ years old?

Some are supposedly almost 400 years. The yellow birch wouldn't be quite as old, but by far the largest I've seen. I thought my spouse was going to topple over looking up at them.

Impressive. Here's a big old-growth one in extreme west MD:

man you were way up there.. on the edge of MI ... lol ...

see any snow yet ... lol ... at least i bet the black flys were gone... i once got chased out of that forest in summer by the marauding hordes ... who knew a fly could hang on to a windshield for a few miles.. at 60 miles per hour ...

i always wondered ... what all the depressions were in an old forest.. as in pic one ... i presumed it was prior harvesting ...

any idea what the holes are ... in second pic ...

thx for the pix ....

ken

In eastern US we still have a tiny (133 acre) relic of what once was a large and ancient forest. This is Cathedral State Park in WVa. Most of the ancient forests fell to the lumbermen and if that wasn't bad enough the hemlock & red spruce forests caught fire and the rich soil, built up over countless centuries burnt all the way to the bedrock. Part of the sad history of W. Virginia.

Ken, I don't think it's due to harvesting. They've had some blowdowns over the years, but supposedly there has never been any logging. Oh, and no flies! We couldn't have had better weather during our three-day stay. Evening temps in upper 30's and daytime highs in the low 60's. Perfect hiking!

I was in Beng's neck of the woods a couple of years ago, but didn't make it to Cathedral State Park. I'm usually pretty good about searching these places out, but somehow missed this one. However, I did have a very good piece of pie in Frostburg. We did make it to Beartown SP and Cranberry Glades Botanical Area in WV, which were both awesome.

Sam (and others), here's a nifty shrub to test your ID skills:

Closer views needed of the shrub.

There's a recent record of a yellow birch in Maine thought to be more than 20' around. As the circumference of trees tends to be roughly about 3 times the diameter, this example is probably about 6'+ thick.

http://www.americanforests.org/bigtree/yellow-birch-betula-alleghaniensis-3/

National records for other trees - including hemlocks - can be found on the same site. These are based on contemporary dimensions of still living (at the time of measurement) examples - not historic records from pioneer times when the primeval forest was being cleared.

http://www.americanforests.org/bigtree/eastern-hemlock-tsuga-canadensis-3/

Dirca palustris

Dang, you are good. And I had a hint all ready to go...

maackia, please answer a question for me. My Gray's Manual says (used by the Indians to make thongs, whence one of the popular names).

What kind of thongs were the Indians making?

What kind of thongs? Mmm, I don't know, but I'm guessing not Victoria's Secret. I know the stems were used for thread-like uses, but the thong thing has me baffled. I need to start reading Gray's Manual...

It would have been footwear, of course.

Love the Porkies! Those are indeed some old-growth stands, no question about it. Last time I was there, saw sugar maples that defied ID, so large were they. Maackia, since you're in my neck of the woods, very roughly speaking, some time check out Cathedral of the Pines just north of Lakewood in Oconto County. That too will prove to be mind-blowing....hemlocks and red and white pine of extraordinary size and age. That site is also a heron rookery, so there is some ongoing damage taking place due to all the bird crap. But still amazing.

+oM

Those are indeed some old-growth stands, no question about it.

We know the stands shown are 200+ years old how? It is documented and reported somewhere? Or the trees look on the big side, so they must be that old?

Old growth has a specific meaning, the significance of which is all the greater now that there is so little of it left.

Thanks for the pix, maackia. Reminded me of my trip to the Sylvania Wilderness near Watersmeet, MI back in 2009.

I was under the impression these were dated with core samples. Some of these areas were too inconvenient to log and thus escaped the saw.

tj

"It is documented and reported somewhere?"

That's a legitimate question. I'm basing this on the MI DNR website, which refers to a section of the park (roughly 35,000 acres) as "old growth." I also talked to a park ranger who stated this section had never been logged and referred to as "old growth." There is also this site.

Finally, for what it's worth...

maackia, the hemlock I show is in Swallow Falls state park -- near Oakland, MD. Here's another pic of mostly hemlocks in the park:

Skepticism is an essential part of science, and indeed, all human thought. But the forest stands referenced here-the Porcupine Mountain one and the Cathedral of the Pines that I mention, are widely understood to be old-growth through and through. We're not making this up! I wouldn't be surprised if at this juncture, some less-heralded part of the US, like the upper midwest, would have more genuine old-growth than the more hyped PNW part of the country. In fact, this is almost certainly the case.

+oM