Thursday, September 7, 2023: Reception at the Generals!
Info:
Sequoia National Park is located in eastern California south of Yosemite at 2,000 meters above sea level. There you can find the largest trees on earth in terms of mass and volume, first of all General Sherman.
My opinion:
One of the highlights of the trip. Indescribable.
Diary:
Driving south from Lake Tahoe, I passed orange and lemon orchards, olive groves, and all the fruit you can imagine. At Fresno, Highway 180 turns off to the east, where it winds through the desert for a bit and then up into the mountains until you’re right at the entrance to Kings Canyon National Park. Kings Canyon and Sequoia are two national parks, but there is no border between them and you only pay the fee once.
I had booked a site at Azalea Campground in Kings Canyon – and at first wondered why I had driven so far when I could have had it all at Blockheide in Gmünd. Until I looked up. Our Waldviertel can certainly keep up with the granite rocks and the shapes they take through weathering, but not with the trees. Because the sequoias are not the only ones that can tower over the Statue of Liberty, the other trees are hardly inferior to them.
Kings Canyon and Sequoia National Parks are home to Giant Sequoias, White Fir, Sugar Pine, Incence Cedar, and the Ponderosa Pine.
Sequoias are related to the redwoods of coastal California and are referred to as their cousins. Both belong to the conifers. They have many common characteristics, all related to superlatives: the bark reddish due to the tannin, which does not burn, the great height, in this respect the redwoods are ahead, because they are the tallest trees on earth. The trunks of the redwoods grow to be about three meters thick, while a mature sequoia can reach eleven meters in diameter. Both intertwine their roots with those of the neighborhood to support each other and get along with very little soil. For sequoias, a layer of soil one meter above the granite is enough for a tree over 75 meters high to grow on it. Accordingly, the root system extends to the sides.
They grow very quickly and as young trees resemble cypresses. When they are about 75 m high, they stop growing and only become thicker. Their bark can become up to 60 cm thick. They lose the lower branches, so they are protected in case of fire.
When I drove from Kings Canyon to Sequoia National Park, I kept being startled because these trees are just so huge. I don’t know how many times I thought, “No way! That can’t be!” But there they stood – and those weren’t even the biggest.
At the Sequoia Museum the Sentinel waits for visitors, allowing them to take pictures and selfies. It is a monarch, a mature and already very thick tree. In front of the tree there is a sign explaining that the Sentinel is only “average.” With its height of 78 m, it lags severely behind the tallest Sequoia at 95 m. In addition, it has “only” a base diameter of 9 m, the thickest Sequoia has 12 m. Its volume is 790m3, while General Sherman’s is 1,487m3. And as far as its weight is concerned, at 635 t compared with 1,256 t, it is almost one of the leanest of its kind. But it is still young with his 2,200 years. The oldest sequoias are a thousand years older.
In Sequoia National Park there is a very wet meadow in the middle of the forest. That’s exactly where most of the Sequoia Monarchs are found. They need a certain climate to thrive, and a lot of other conditions. The sequoias in the photos have diameters of at least seven meters and are about 75 meters high.
For them to grow this large, the soil must have the right moisture, the forest must be open and sunny, the climate must not be too cold, and the soil must contain ashes.
The meadow is located in a depression, so the water from the surrounding hills collects above the granite. That would be much too wet for the sequoias, so none grow in the meadow. But they need an enormous amount of water and help themselves to that which flows down the hills.
When a fire breaks out, it creates the conditions for the seeds to sprout: unvegetated, ashy soil. The fire also kills fungal growths in the soil that would harm the baby sequoias. But the dependence on fire goes further: the cones open only at a certain heat, then the seeds fall out and hit the ground freshly prepared for them. If they landed on foliage or other plants, they would not have a chance to sprout.
If the fire gets hot enough to kill the mature trees, several sequoias of the same age will later be found in that spot. They have especially good conditions, because there are no old trees nearby with which they have to fight for water. In the survivors’ burn scars, bark grows over them again from the side.
Over the course of a long Sequoia life, conditions can change. If a tree grows in a place where it will later become too wet for it, it will stand with its legs wide apart, that is, the base will become even thicker so that it will not fall over in the wet ground. However, if the roots drown or it leans to the side, its years are numbered.
The oldest sequoias are 3,300 years old. Soil studies have shown that until 4,000 years ago, the climate was too dry for trees to thrive. It was too cold until 12,000 years ago. The plants that grew there at that time have since migrated 1,000 m further up.
In 1974, Ranger Bill Tweed heard a Sequoia fall. First, there were loud cracks as the roots broke, then the tree fell with a loud clap of thunder. He and his colleagues found a splintered trunk from which “an amazing amount” of water was flowing. He touched the inner wood. It was icy cold.
Ed and Ned are two sequoias that grew together over time. Their base was represented near them with stones. It measures 10.3 m x 7.6 m. This is the size of average apartments in our country.
Sequoias occur only on the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada, and there only between 1,500 and 2,300 meters above sea level. Above it is too cold, below it is too dry. This zone is called the Sequoia Belt. And even there, there are only 75 places where conditions are right enough for them to thrive.
And here are some more numbers:
A Sequoia is the largest tree on earth by volume, namely General Sherman. General Grant is the third largest.
The tallest tree is a Coast Redwood on the California coast, which reaches 112 meters in height with a diameter of 3 meters.
If you calculate diameter and height, a Sugar Pine (pine species) in the Central Sierra Nevada wins.
The world’s thickest tree is located in Oaxaca in Mexico and has a diameter of 14 m. This cypress is probably a combination of several trunks.
In terms of age, Pristlecone Pines, also a pine species, can’t be beat. In California’s White Mountains, you can view a 4,700-year-old tree. (There is one that is over 5,000 years old, but its location is not published to protect it, and here in the U.S. I have not found any information about it anywhere).
And while we’re on the subject of records: May I introduce General Sherman, the largest tree on earth! 11 m base diameter, 31 m base circumference, 84 m high, weighing 1,256 t, 1,487m3 volume, 2,200 years old.
Closely followed by General Grant, the third largest tree on earth! 82 m high, 12 m base diameter, making it the thickest Sequoia with a base circumference of 33 m – and that at the age of only 1,700 years! Its volume is 1,320m3 and it weighs 1,325 t. If you were to fill its trunk with basketballs, you would need 159,000 of them, and with table tennis balls it would be 37 million – whatever this comparison is good for. In 1926, General Grant was declared the Nation’s Christmas Tree by then U.S. President Calvin Coolidge.
These trees are so incredible that even after two days in the national park, I was still startled when I saw one. They simply surpass anything we can imagine. We also have tall and thick trees in Austria – but no comparison to the sequoias. Even a Sequoia that is only a hundred years old would already “look down” on any tree in Austria, no matter how old it is. These are dimensions that are so far outside of what we know and are used to – simply inconceivable.
Kings Canyon and Sequoia National Park was again one of the places where I couldn’t stop being amazed and was just happy to be there. I experienced a special moment when I visited General Grant again before I left. The parking lot near it was pretty full, and around the Monarchs there is always the usual photo and selfie hubbub. And yet: There I suddenly found myself standing alone in front of the giant for about ten minutes. It was completely silent in the woods, except for the usual squirrel scolding a bit and two others chasing each other.
What this tree may have experienced? A creature that is so large because it finds exactly the conditions it needs. What will the future bring it? Will it and the other sequoias survive climate change? The Grant Tree will probably just let that come to it, too, as it has done for millennia.
For me, the minutes of silence amidst these incredible trees were a precious parting gift. As I walked back to the parking lot, there were suddenly hordes of people talking loudly as they marched toward Grant Tree.
I started Annie Way, and we headed south to the Mojave Desert, not back to Fresno, but to Pinehurst and Visalia, on the steepest and most winding road of the entire trip. Unfortunately, it was paved. Still, an experience that made Annie Way purr!