Old Growth

Old Growth

Noel Laflin

3-10-22

I look at pine trees growing in our greenbelt here on the outer edges of suburbia and marvel at how tall they have grown in less than forty years. When planted, they were no taller than myself. Thirty-eight years later the pines are just under fifty feet in height, and are home to raptors, songbirds, and fox squirrels. The shade they provide is wonderful, and the pine cones numerous.

All this gets me to thinking about camp, of course, and reminds me that most of the lush forest that we called home half a century ago was not much older than the age of these trees outside my door here in Orange.

Sure, many of the stately oaks in camp were older, along with some ponderosas, and the giant white fir tree in Lightningville (estimated to be over four hundred years old) but on the whole, what we grew up in was primarily new growth, as logging in the San Bernardino Mt. Range had only ceased by 1915. That meant that when the council finally purchased the land they would christen Ahwahnee in 1955, the majority of the trees were only forty years old.

Consequently, this often makes me wonder how much different camp, and all of the surrounding area would have looked, barring forest fires, of course, had we inherited it in its old growth, primal state. And keep in mind that our neck of the woods was never touched by fire, other than the occasional lightning strike.

Wikipedia gives a brief summation of old growth as, "An old-growth forest – also termed primary forest, virgin forest, late seral forest, primeval forest or first-growth forest – is a forest that has attained great age without significant disturbance and thereby exhibits unique ecological features and might be classified as a climax community.

In scientific ecology, climax community or climatic climax community is a historic term for a community of plants, animals, and fungi which, through the process of ecological succession in the development of vegetation in an area over time, have reached a steady state. This equilibrium was thought to occur because the climax community is composed of species best adapted to average conditions in that area."

In my mind, all of that means is, damn, I wish we could have seen and been a part of that old, virgin, primeval, steady, harmonious community of trees.

And yet, despite all that limited that from occurring, it was still the most memorable place on Earth.

And still is.

I am grateful for the ever growing evergreens, just outside my door, for the constant reminder.

I'm even grateful for the damn squirrels.