34 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



January 10, 1919 



A tree's size is no guiile to its age. A good many people fail 

 to get a grip on that fact. From time to tim? articles make the 

 rounds of magazines and papers, purporting to give instances of 

 very old trees in various parts of the %vorld: and the farther away 

 these trees are^-thie greater interest some people take in them. In 

 almost every such instance, the estimate of the tree's age is based 

 on its size. However, a tradition is sometimes cited to give 

 authenticity to the claims of great age. 



There are two reliable methods of fixing a tree's age, and only 

 two. One is, to count the growth rings from the center to the bark. 

 It will not do to count part of the rings and estimate the balance, 

 because a tree does not generally grow at a uniform rate during its 

 whole life, and some of the rings are wider than others. The num- 

 ber of rings gives the tree 's ag3 in years, because each year pro- 

 duces one ring. The other method of arriving at a tree's age is to 

 consult a record of the time when it began its existence and of the 

 time when it fell. The included period represents the tree 's age. 

 In some instances such records are obtainable for old tre^s, but 

 usually they are not. It is not ordinarily practicable to count the 

 rings of a standing tree, though it may occasionally be done. For 

 that reason, the ages of standing trees are seldom determined by 

 counting their rings. 



The conclusion that because a tree is very large it must be very 

 old, is the result of faulty reasoning; but there are many instances 

 where such conclusions have been announced as facts. A certain 

 cypress tree in Mexico, that Humboldt measured, is a familiar 

 example. Because this trees is nearly forty feet in diameter, its age 

 has been variously estimated from 5,000 to 7,000 years. The esti- 

 mate is absolutely worthless. That massive trunk is made up of a 

 dozen or so smaller trees which stood so closely together when young 

 that they grew fast to one another, thus forming one bale of many 

 smaller ones. The age, of course, is no greater than the age of the 

 oldest of the individuals forming the trunk. 



Certain South American trees are credited with being nearly 10,000 

 years old because they are very large; and in India and Australia 

 there are others of the same sort. Yet those treos may be smaller 

 than others in other parts of the world that are known to be less 

 than a thousand years old. 



What, then, is the greatest age that trees can attain! Nobody 

 knows. Some kinds of trees live longer than others. Every tree 

 lives until it meets a fatal accident. If it succumbs to "old age," 

 even that is an accident that never fails to prove fatal, for it 

 weakens the tree so that insects, fungus, or malnutrition kills it. 

 So long as a tree bears leaves, it grows. The average ages of 

 mature trees of certain kinds are pretty well known. The jack 

 pine of our northern states and Canada lives from eighty to one 

 hundred years, if it escapes fire and the ax. Some oaks may attain 

 500 years, but probably not one in ten thousand is that old. That 

 is believed to be about the extreme limit of the age of white pine; 

 but in the lumbered tracts one would likely count the rings on many 

 thousand pine stumps before finding one as much as 400 years old. 

 Bald cypress may attain an age of 800 years. Some stumps have 

 nearly that many rings. Western red cedar has been known to 

 exceed an age of 1,200 years, and that is about the limit of 

 Douglas fir. 



The sequoias or redwoods of California are generally conceded 

 to be the longest-lived of American trees, but a great deal of fiction 

 and guesswork concerning their ages has been published. They are 

 said to be "the oldest living things," and that may be true; but 

 no dependence should be placed in claims of 4,000 or 5,000 years 

 as the ages of these trees. It is true that John Muir counted 4,000 

 rings on one of these trees, and he was worthy of belief. He was 

 io worthy of belief that he was careful not to state that the tree 

 was 4,000 years old. He said the rings were so wavy and folded 



that he was uncertain. Ages exceeding 2,000 years for some of 

 these trees appear to be well authenticated. An exact count and 

 measurement of a tree a little less than 28 feet in diameter is a 

 record iu the Tuited States Forest Service, showing an age of 

 1,245 years when that tree was cut in 1864. It was one of the 

 largest seijuoias on record, though not the oldest. 



It is not possible to determine an average age of trees, without 

 being particular to specify the kind of trees, their number, and 

 soveral other factors. The average age of merchantable trees 

 encountered by one walking through the forests in those parts of 

 the United States east of the Rocky Mountains is probablxJess than 

 200 years, though many are much older. Persons who wish to have 

 first-hand knowledge of forest trees will do well to cultivate the 

 habit of counting rings in sawlogs and stumps in various localities 

 and of different species. Such experience will lead to a good deal 

 of practical knowledge of tree ages. It will assist in checking up 

 on some of the wild guesses one often hears concerning ages of trees. 



An oak tree that grew in the court house yard at Monroe, La., 

 was 49 inches in diameter and 55 yoars old. In northwestern Okla- 

 homa and southern Kansas there are thousands of oaks older than 

 that and not one inch in diameter. A pine near Monterey, Cali- 

 fornia, was 35 inches in diameter and 42 years old. On the higl 

 mountains of the same state there are pines much older, yet not 

 large enough for canes. These instances serve to emphasize the 

 fact that size is not a reliable guide to the ages of trees. 



No Wood Exports from Russia 



The bolslu'viki of Russia are systematically killing all business 

 which yet remains in that wretched country. The latest move- 

 ment in that direction was an announcement or order that all timber 

 shall be worked only by committees directly responsible to the 

 government, and that no wood shall be exported. This order is in ' 

 effect only in those parts of Russia under control of the red forces, 

 or anarchists represented by Lenine. That means only the region 

 tributary to Petrograd at this time. So far as the result can be 

 foreseen, it will prevent the shipment of lumber of any kind from 

 that region to other European countries, and will provide that much 

 more market for the output of American saw mills. The order will 

 probably have little effect, because Russia is not now in a position 

 to export lumber, veneer, timber, or anj-thing else that civilized 

 countries will want to buy. 



The Comparative Value of Lumber 



A correspondent writes to the Parkersburg, W. Va., Sentinel to 

 prove that lumber is one of the cheapest commodities in that mar- 

 ket and that since 1913 it has advanced in price less than the 

 average of other commodities. It is asserted that the increase in 

 the average price of lumber there has been 39 per cent in five 

 years, while other commodities, arranged in groups and averaged, 

 have advanced 100 per cent. These conueeclities which would 

 have been required in exchange for 1,000 feet of lumber in 1913, 

 could now be exchanged for 1,440 feet of the same grade of 

 lumber. 



Ships for ocean voyages were built on the Ohio river at Pitts- 

 burgh and below about 120 years ago. Some of the vessels visited 

 Europe, and one of them was held tip in an Italian port because 

 the authorities suspected that its papers were forgeries, because 

 its home port. Marietta, had never been heard of in that part of 

 Italy. The Ohio river ships were constructed largely of black wal- 

 nut. They sailed from Pittsburgh with cargoes of coal, and with 

 walnut, cherry, and birch furniture. , 



