FORESTS OF THE PACIFIC COAST 



the Sequoia National Park, where trees of every 

 age, from seedlings to weathered ancients, occur in 

 great abundance and in markedly different habitats. 

 This park holds the Giant Forest, which may well 

 be considered in many respects the most remark- 

 able forest on the eartti's surface. 



The Coast Ranges present fundamentally dif- 

 ferent conditions from the Sierra Nevada. They 

 are of far less altitude and broken into shorter 

 ranges with narrow intervening valleys. The inner 

 ranges are nearly barren or merely chaparral- 

 covered, while a true forest is found only on the 

 ranges in the immediate neighborhood of the ocean, 

 or sometimes on mountain summits, where these 

 reach a sufficient altitude. Two outstanding fea- 

 tures make an appeal to the traveler: One 

 is the Redwood Belt, mainly north of the Golden 

 Gate; the other the peculiar and very small "tree 

 islands" scattered at intervals along the very edge 

 of the continental bench, mainly south of the Golden 

 Gate. These two leading features, in common with 

 many others, which are associated with a more 

 varied topography as well as with an oceanic cli- 

 mate, combine to give the woodlands of the Coast 

 Ranges a unique and in some respects a more varied 

 interest than the forests of the Sierras. 



The Redwood Belt is 450 miles long and one 

 to twenty, rarely more, miles wide. The coast 

 redwood (Sequoia sempervirens) is a scarcely less 

 remarkable tree than the Big Tree. It is the tallest 

 tree on earth, even exceeding in height the Big 

 Tree,* and attains an extreme height of 350 feet and 

 with trunk diameters averaging ten to sixteen feet. 

 In the areas of best development, on the lower Eel, 

 Van Duzen, Mad and Smith rivers of the north 

 coast, it has established nearly or quite pure forests. 

 No other tree is able to compete with the coast red- 

 wood in its chosen home, partly because of biologi- 

 cal peculiarities of the redwood and partly because 

 of climatic conditions. The first named factor, the 

 biological peculiarities, will be considered first. 



When an adult redwood tree is overthrown, or 

 is felled by the axe, it produces about its base large 

 numbers of stump sprouts, which eventually, by 

 competition among the survivors, form a circle of 

 trees, which is called a "redwood circle." Beautiful 

 examples of nearly perfect circles may be studied 

 to advantage in Mill Valley, within an hour's ride 

 of San Francisco by suburban train. No Big Tree 



* Mr. J. H. Maiden, Government botanist of New South 

 Wales, makes the statement that no authentic measurements 

 of eucalyptus trees exceed those of Sequoia gigantea. 



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