VITALITY OF THE SEQUOIA GIGANTEA ^ DUDLEY 35 



number of observations on several species of conifers and oaks enables us 

 to answer that it does, approximately, in those observed on the Pacific Coast. 

 If exceptional seasons cause variations from this rule, the variations would 

 be small in number and not greatly affect the totals. During my examina- 

 tion of the felled trees of the Kings River, it was a part of my task to 

 carefully traverse these records of growth; but I will here give you briefly 

 only the results. Of the various trunks of Sequoia gigantea examined rang- 

 ing from 900 years upward, the oldest possessed 2,425 rings, or had begun 

 its existence 525 years before the Christian era. Extended scrutiny un- 

 doubtedly would bring to light trees even older than this, but I do not 

 expect any to exceed 3,000 years of age. 



It has often been inferred that the size of a Big Tree bears an approxi- 

 mately exact relation to its age. If a tree exists eighty feet in circumference 

 five feet above the base, it was inferred, it would be twice as old as one 

 forty feet in circumference. This was found to be very far from true. The 

 favorite situation of the larger trees is near some hollow, where a tiny 

 perennial spring brook is always flowing. The soil should be good and 

 deep, but with a large amount of mineral matter in it; and above all, I 

 think well drained, though always moist. 



One tree occupying such a situation and at the confluence of two small 

 Sierra Brooks, was over eighty feet in circumference ten feet from the 

 ground, but was only 1,510 years old, all the rings being measurably thick 

 and uniform. It felt the effects neither of drouth nor of unusual precipita- 

 tion, and it had never been burned beneath its bark. 



On the other hand, the tree which a little later I shall use as the chief 

 illustration of this paper, was a small tree for one of its age. It stood 

 on a hillside not near a stream; the influence of years of abundant rains 

 and nutrition were shown by rings of fair degree of thickness; the effects 

 of years of scarcity were seen in rings so thin that fifty of them would 

 not cover an inch of the tree's radius. Moreover, from its unprotected 

 situation it had been seriously attacked by forest fires, each burning away 

 portions of its sap-wood and thus assailing the vitality of the plant. This 

 tree was only thirty-nine feet in circumference ten feet from the ground, 

 but had attained the age of 2,171 years and a height approaching 300 feet, 

 although injury and failing strength had resulted in a dead and broken 

 top and reduced the tree to 270 feet at the time of its destruction in 1900. 



Observations of the greatest interest, however, concerned the Big Tree's 

 behavior toward severe injury; evidences of a remarkable recuperative power 

 being found after examination of the Sequoias of the Converse Basin. The 

 effects of certain tremendous forest fires were registered in the trunks of 



