Any Arbos @ Redwoods mid-8/08? (Wild Trees )

mdvaden

mdvaden

Participating member
Location
Beaverton. Oregon
Curious if any Arborists will be around the north CA redwoods around August 11 - 14, 2008

???

Reason being, I'll be down that way, including visiting the Atlas Grove and Grove of Titans which many know about from Preston's Wild Trees book. Will be at Curly Redwood Lodge in Crescent City, CA, and Harris Beach State Park in Brookings, OR, just over the border.

Would like to bring up a matter / subject ...

From emails I get, and etc., it's evident there are people who would love to see these trees: Del Norte Titan, Lost Monarch, Iluvatar, etc..

Preston wrote something in The Wild Trees about the location of the Grove of Titans that is 180 degrees backasswards; misleading; opposite of fact.

In other words, if someone wants to locate the Grove of Titans, and include everything Preston wrote for their quest, they will EXCLUDE the actual location.

I'm not inclined to share much about the grove's location with just anybody. But I believe that professionals who respect trees, should have a "fighting chance" at minimum, if they want to look for these specimens.

Locating the groves and their exact locations, has begun to shed some light on the nature of how Preston writes.

Anyway, for Certified Arborists, botanical garden staff, etc., I think you deserve a crack at seeing these trees in the years ahead.

Attached is one of several ...

My signature relates to these, so Del Norte Titan will be a good post wallpaper ...

136623-Del_Norte_Mario400.jpg
 

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Re: Any Arbos @ Redwoods mid-8/08?

Cool. Glad you enjoyed it.

Seems there is one person who is anticipating touring the redwoods. There's a few items of interest in the groves too. Even subtle stuff like the type of rock pulled up with the roots of nearby fallen trees. The area exposes part of it's history. Hopefully the enormous chunk of canopy soil that fell out of El Viejo del Norte is still intact. I'd like to take some video of it.
 
Re: Any Arbos @ Redwoods mid-8/08?

Hi i will be in San Fransico in October 08, which is the best and easist site to visit tallest redwoods.
How long is it from san fransico and should i take a tour.
Also can you recommend a tour group.

Thanks
 
Re: Any Arbos @ Redwoods mid-8/08?

[ QUOTE ]
Hi i will be in San Fransico in October 08, which is the best and easist site to visit tallest redwoods.
How long is it from san fransico and should i take a tour.
Also can you recommend a tour group.

Thanks

[/ QUOTE ]

Not sure about tour groups - never tried one yet. Sounds like Muir Woods is one of the big San Francisco destinations for redwoods. A big heavier for visitors, but a very nice place. And October is the off season, so it may be even more relaxed. Humboldt county's redwoods may be worth the reach.

Muir Woods won't have the biggest. And if your first visit, you may not want to miss visiting the largest stands. I meet international visitors all the time who have never been there, and they stand looking like they've been given anesthesia prior to a surgery - LOL. Similarly with visitors from other states.

With a bit of prep work on the internet, you may be able to learn enough of the small tid-bits that tour guides would share about tree knowledge, etc.. In which case, with a rental car, you may be able to see more spots quicker. I think I'd skip the tour if I wanted to cover some distance. But maybe use a tour for a short concentrated look.
 
Re: Any Arbos @ Redwoods mid-8/08?

I would love to go out with you, but I will miss you by about a week. My girlfriend and I are taking a roadtrip out there in late August. We are planning on staying at Crater Lake, OR on Aug 24 and then going down into the redwoods on the 25-27th.
 
Re: Any Arbos @ Redwoods mid-8/08?

[ QUOTE ]
Hi i will be in San Fransico in October 08, which is the best and easist site to visit tallest redwoods.
How long is it from san fransico and should i take a tour.
Also can you recommend a tour group.

Thanks

[/ QUOTE ]

Just got an email from these folks today:

REDWOOD ADVENTURES

Seems they have some stuff I may want to do myself next year.

[ QUOTE ]
I would love to go out with you, but I will miss you by about a week. My girlfriend and I are taking a roadtrip out there in late August. We are planning on staying at Crater Lake, OR on Aug 24 and then going down into the redwoods on the 25-27th.

[/ QUOTE ]

When you go to the redwoods from Crater Lake, I suppose you will go by Grants Pass and use Highway 199.

Before Cave Junction, in Kerby, is a Burl Gallery "It's a Burl" - check it out. I heard from the folks there, that "Sherrill", probably Tobe, stopped and bought some stuff too. They said it was a tree gear company owner.

About 10 miles before Jedediah Smith Redwoods, at mile marker 17 or 18 along Hy. 199, on the right, is a botanical wayside, and after a few minutes walk, is a really nice Cobra Lily bog, that may also have Volmer's Lily blooming too.
 
[ QUOTE ]
Preston wrote something in The Wild Trees about the location of the Grove of Titans that is 180 degrees backasswards; misleading; opposite of fact.

[/ QUOTE ]

Mario, I appreciate the work you've put in locating these trees but I don't get why you're dissing Preston so much in this thread and on your web site. It was his obligation to obscure the locations. And he wrote the book that opened your eyes to these trees, no gratitude? Soil compaction and understory/ground cover disturbance from foot traffic around these trees is not going to help them. Look at photos of the heavily visited redwoods and you'll notice the bare compacted soil around the base of the trees. I'd hate to see that happen to the Atlas Grove and the Grove of Titans.

Can't anyone who's interested in looking at old-growth redwoods just go to the redwood parks and find excellent trees on their own? There have to be many interesting old-growth redwoods to look at without disturbing the small number of trees that Sillett is studying.
-moss
 
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Preston wrote something in The Wild Trees about the location of the Grove of Titans that is 180 degrees backasswards; misleading; opposite of fact.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't get why you're dissing Preston so much in this thread and on your web site. It was his obligation to obscure the locations. And he wrote the book that opened your eyes to these trees, no gratitude?
-moss

[/ QUOTE ]

Moss...

It's easier to omit a statement, than to put in a 180 reversal. And had that happened, the grove would have been even more obscured. Realize, I did not say that he deliberately misinformed. But it's true, that something in the book is misleading.

Further, the book could EASILY have been written, by omitting a half dozen non-essential paragraphs that spilled beans.

Now, Preston wrote something, that I accepted as fact, that almost wasted 2 full days of my time, by relying on it as non-fiction. In fact, it's caused me to wonder about the accuracy of other stuff in the book that is not verifiable.

Had Sillett and Preston wanted to keep people from these trees, the best thing they could have done was to not support a book.

It seems a bit alarming, that when I write a true fact on my own site, that you would question me for simply writing the facts, and on the other hand, exalt Preston, for writing something apparently backwards.

As far as a responsibility to make the trees "obscure" - I don't think so. Preston's book, and publications of others, have become the Yellow Brick Road to the groves.

Geez ... I'm getting emails from folks telling be of them bumping into other people at the groves. Second to last time at the Grove of Titans, there is a local lady showing another local lady, stemming from a map that the one woman got from some man. And as I was playing ignorant, she starts pointing them out and naming them to me.

I mean, between the people that already have seen these, and Preston's publicity, the number of visitors appears to be growing exponentially.
 
Thanks for the advice.
So you recommend hiring a car and heading for Humbolt, is this were i will find the bigger trees.
How long in a car from San Fransico, can i do it easly in a day or will i need to stay over night.
 
The groves are being more heavily visited. There's not doubt about that. However, as in the past, the far majority of people visiting the redwood parks seldom venture beyond the roadside groves. And in those groves you will find a well trod path.

And even so the paths through the trees are no more in number than they were 20-30 years ago. So the impact is staying pretty contained. In a few places I have seen the parks elevate the paths. Not a bad idea, but I've always wondered why they don't mulch the paths. That would solve most soil compaction problems at a very low cost and do it totally with native materials. The people running the parks are pretty slow to doing things right. Like control burns. Now that is something that should be high on their priority list, but like most things they just kick it around until it's too late.

Later on I'll post some pic's of the Montgomery Woods fire to show you how the parks manage our old growth forests. Pretty sad.
 
[ QUOTE ]
I mean, between the people that already have seen these, and Preston's publicity, the number of visitors appears to be growing exponentially.

[/ QUOTE ]
You're criticizing Preston for writing the book and publicizing the groves and you're doing the same.

Ya got me confused.

[ QUOTE ]
...Preston wrote something, that I accepted as fact, that almost wasted 2 full days of my time, by relying on it as non-fiction....

[/ QUOTE ]
So that's why you're pissed off at him. Two days roaming around redwood forest sounds excellent to me. You should thank him!

[ QUOTE ]
As far as a responsibility to make the trees "obscure" - I don't think so. Preston's book, and publications of others, have become the Yellow Brick Road to the groves.

[/ QUOTE ]
I didn't say make the trees obscure, I said "make the locations obscure". I think the whole point of the book was to tell a great story about interesting people discovering cool things about these amazing trees and canopy ecosystems. As far as I know Preston didn't intend to reveal the locations and he had a responsibility to Dr. Sillett not to.
-moss
 
[ QUOTE ]
The groves are being more heavily visited. ... I've always wondered why they don't mulch the paths. That would solve most soil compaction problems at a very low cost and do it totally with native materials. The people running the parks are pretty slow to doing things right. ...

[/ QUOTE ]

The delayed action has been noticeable in Oregon too. Not sure speedier action would have helped our champion Sitka that broke off last winter, but a deck / boardwalk was around it some years after heavy foot traffic showed up.

Would have been nice if they had built a boardwalk around just the back side, because when they encircled it with the deck, it blocked the view of the enormous trunk flare.

I always thought it was odd, that Oregon's big Sitka should just happen to be just like a 1000 feet off the main highway to the coast.

Moss ...

Did you read what Van Pelt wrote in his forest giant book about the Grove of Titans tree's locations?

You are barking up the wrong tree.

Authors like Preston, or anyone else, are not immune from people writing in response about the accuracy of information.

Had I wanted to criticize Preston - on that page - there would be other stuff instead. Like how he wrote it was getting dark on the day of discovery, and the Sillett and Taylor still had time to find the man who was taking pictures, and where he was taking pictures.

My page is not about tearing down Preston, it's about the facts.
 
[ QUOTE ]

Moss ...

Did you read what Van Pelt wrote in his forest giant book about the Grove of Titans tree's locations?


[/ QUOTE ]

I did, Van Pelt's account is inspiring as are his drawings and measuring work. He is the original tree measuring guru and the premier tall tree artist. Not sure what you're getting at though. Van Pelt's writing reinforces what I've thought all along, if anyone wants to see some awesome coast redwoods, get out to the redwood parks (either Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park or Redwood National Park) and get into the woods and take a look around. I will make the pilgrimage, maybe next year I hope.
-moss
 
Previous, when mentioning Van Pelt, I was referring to him publishing extra pieces of the puzzle about the location of the Grove of Titans.

As for inspiration - I think Van Pelt most likely tends to inspire people to look for the biggest, "baddest" and tallest. That's the overshadowing nature of the book, along with the "there is always a bigger one out there" motto.

Big tree hunting won't be the most common motive for people to purchase the publication, but the giant tree aspect really intrigues a lot of the readers.

It has one of the better explanations about how to measure trees.
 
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