This is the first post in a series aimed at documenting and celebrating the many mature Douglas fir trees that are growing on the back half of our property. It is my hope that conducting this verbal and pictorial process will bring me even closer to these majestic creatures. I respect and admire them so much, and they've come to mean the world to me.
I called them “creatures” just now, which should give you a fair idea how I tend to view the vegetated portion of the world in general. I find it increasingly difficult to draw hard-and-fast distinctions among the various modes of life on the planet, and in some ways consider such labels as “animal,” “plant,” and “insect” artificial and unnecessary. The notion that we humans are fundamentally separate and distinct from any other living thing on this planet doesn't work for me these days. It's just too obvious to me how connected and interconnected it all is. I guess I am coming closer and closer to fully embracing the Gaia Hypothesis, and I definitely tend, at least partially, towards Animism on occasion.
But enough about me – it’s on to the trees! And I am starting with #1, although I will digress and get out of order frequently after this first excursion into the woods
The first thing to get your head around is the fact the Douglas fir isn’t a member of the Fir family at all; it’s a member of the Pine family. Pseudotsuga menziesii is its scientific name, and I’m still wrestling with that. “Pseudo” is from the ancient Greek and means “false.” “Tsuga” is from the Japanese language and means hemlock tree, referencing the fact that the Douglas fir is often confused with that variety of tree. It’s enough to make a guy shake his head and move on.
The Menzeiesii part makes a little more sense. Archibald Menzies was born toward the end of the Age of Enlightenment and became a naval officer, surgeon, botanist, and artist. He was a fascinating character, a contemporary of another famous Scotsman and botanist, David Douglas. During his visits to the Pacific Northwest, Douglas sent the first seeds of the species back to Britain. Douglas gave the tree its scientific name and honored Menzies in the process. That’s how the fir/false hemlock/pine tree was “discovered” by Menzies, yet ended up with Douglas for its common name.
#1’s trunk is roughly 6’ in diameter and it is about 150’ tall. It is one of the largest Douglas firs on the property. An educated guess puts it at about 100 -120 years old, typical statistics for the many large firs on the property and in our tree-blessed neighborhood. This entire area was heavily logged during the first part of the last Century, when the Timber Industry was at its peak.
I shudder to think of how the area must have looked when this tree was just beginning to grow. Turn of the century timber operations were conducted without much scruple for environmental concerns. Remember, this was the same period in which the hills of Seattle were cut down to size and the Panama Canal was built; those same mechanical and environmental sensitivities were employed in the clear-cutting of western Washington.
It's hard to believe #1 is really a young specimen, it's so tall and straight, and truly is a hefty piece of wood; but by Douglas Fir tree standards this tree is definitely just hitting its stride. They can get up to 300+ feet tall and be as big 8 feet in diameter. With any luck at all it can expect to live another 300 years or so, and a 500 year life-span is not out of the question. There are of course lots of variables involved with such speculations, but it could happen. This youngster has already weathered some tough times.
Forty years ago, or thereabouts, when this lot was first being cleared, a bulldozer or some other large piece of heavy equipment was working the land and gave #1 a nasty wound in the lowest section of the trunk. It could have been fatal at the time, but the tree was healthy enough to take defensive action. In a complex and fascinating process called compartmentalization, trees do not “heal” so much as they “wall off” or isolate injury. In a sense they grow a new tree around the site of wounds and disease. Compartmentalization in progress can be seen in the photo below.
The understory here has changed significantly since this tree started growing. Where once there were only sword fern, mahonia, salal and other natives in abundance there is now an increasing number of transplants also crowding the base of #1: non-native Rhododendrons mostly, plus some ubiquitous Herb Robert and the occasional, unwelcome non-native blackberry.
When we can, we yank out the blackberry and tolerate a few of the Stinky-Bob - somehow there's always a little clump or two we somehow missed. We also keep an eye open for insects and quickly dispatch any we recognize as harmful; the rest we simply admire and let them go on their way. Overall we do our best to be good stewards for these great trees and the rest. It gives back way more than we can ever repay.