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IMAGINE - NOT A SINGLE 'BIG TREE' IN CARVER COUNTY!
Big trees have always fascinated me.
When my dad said to park a farm implement next to "the big elm," I knew precisely the spot he meant.
Since the beginning of civilization, people have used big trees to direct others to a destination - i.e., "...stay on that road 'til you get to the giant oak tree, then turn right."
Meg Hanisch, with the forestry division of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, sent me a list this week of Minnesota's biggest trees.
The list contains measurements for circumference (measured 4-1/2 feet above the ground), height and crown spread for 53 native tree species.
Minnesota's tallest tree is a 128-foot white spruce in Koochiching County. The tree with the broadest crown spread - 117 feet - is a silver maple near Hastings. And the tree with the biggest trunk is an eastern cottonwood in Rice County - a monstrous beast with a girth of 30.4 feet. Think about the size of this tree - five adults, standing in a circle with their arms spread full, couldn't link their hands around it!
Earlier this fall, my son Fletcher and I took the short hikes to Itasca Park's two big trees - the state's largest red pine (also called Norway pine) and what used to be the state's largest white pine.
The red pine stands 120 feet tall, has a crown of 36 feet and a trunk circumference of 9 feet, 8 inches (it may also be the most photographed tree in Minnesota).
Itasca's white pine is more impressive, with a trunk circumference of 14 feet 5 inches, a height of 112 feet and a crown spread of 49 feet. Although the sign at the base of this white pine claims it is Minnesota's record, it's been bumped from first place among white pines by a 15-foot circumference, 115-foot tall specimen near Bowstring in Itasca County.
The DNR list includes some other impressive trees. It lists, for example, a black walnut tree in Olmstead County with a circumference of 13 feet, 3 inches and a crown of 110 feet. Imagine the value of this tree in terms of furniture or veneer.
Other native trees with huge circumferences include a basswood in Washington County measuring more than 15 feet, a northern white cedar in Koochiching County of more than 11 feet, a bur oak near St. Peter of just under 20 feet and a black willow in St. Paul of more than 23 feet.
Almost 20 years ago, my dad and I walked along the Minnesota River northeast of Kelly's Lake in southern Carver County and measured the circumference of a cottonwood tree at over 26 feet. Dad said he first measured this tree in the early '30s. Its circumference then was 21 feet. I haven't returned to the site but Dad said he looked for the tree several years ago and it wasn't there anymore - most likely a victim of the river bottom floods of a couple of years ago. Kind of sad, isn't it, that such a specimen might now be nothing more than a rotting snag in the Minnesota River? Or perhaps it's providing underwater cover for a state record catfish.
The DNR registry of biggest trees might not, in fact, list Minnesota's biggest trees, Hanisch says. All it lists, she points out, is Minnesota's identified biggest trees. "There are many unreported giants just waiting to be found," Hanisch believes.
Of the 53 biggest trees on the list, not one is in Carver County. That doesn't seem right, does it? I think we simply haven't done our jobs locating our big trees. In other words, as you set out on your hikes in the days ahead, pack along a tape measure and report your findings - let's get a Carver County tree added to Minnesota's Native Big Tree Registry!
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