Sunday, August 24, 2014

Top gone!


Recently The preserve witnessed the beginning of the end of one of its largest trees. The big pine with the split top which resides near the Brookside entrance lost both it's tops. Lightening might have been the cause. Each top crashed through the forest toppling smaller trees and creating a small opening for new growth. 
Each year, Tom Dale would line up 1st graders, 3 at a time, to see if they could wrap the tree's base finger tip to finger tip. That gives you an idea of its girth. The base is still there - a good fifty feet high. Now without a green needle to support it, it will become home to insects, and then woodpeckers and others as it's final end.