Forests
Mohawk Trail State Forest is specifically known for its tall trees. A total of 612 acres (248 ha) of the state forest is classified as pre-settlement old growth by researchers. Trees approaching 500 years in age have been confirmed. Most of the extremely old trees are Eastern hemlock. Other species reaching significant age include yellow and black birch, sugar maple, red spruce, and northern red oak. Specimens of examples of all these species exceed 300 years in age and numerous trees of a dozen species surpass 200 years. Trees over 150 years old in Mohawk are very common. In addition to the old growth, Mohawk Trail State Forest contains many of the tallest trees in Massachusetts as verified by the Eastern Native Tree Society. Most of these tallest trees are between 100 and 200 years old and are properly classified as second growth. Among the tall tree species, the white pine stands supreme. As of the end of the 2011 growing season, 122 eastern white pines had been measured to heights of 150 feet or more and 14 surpass 160 feet (49 m). The tallest accurately measured single tree as tracked by the Eastern Native Tree Society in the New England grows in Mohawk and measured 169.6 feet (51.7 m) in height at the end of the 2011 growing season. The tree is named for Mohawk dignitary, the late Chief Jake Swamp. Of public properties in the Northeast, only Cook Forest State Park in Pennsylvania rivals Mohawk Trail State Forest in the 150-foot (46 m) and over height class. The present count for Cook Forest as determined by the Eastern Native Tree Society and the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources is 112. The Eastern Native Tree Society maintains records of all white pines in the Northeast confirmed to a height of 150 feet or more.
In addition to the white pine, the white ash also reaches to heights of 150 feet (46 m) in Mohawk Trail State Forest. Two trees have been measured to over 150 feet and around 20 surpass 140 feet (43 m) in height. Altogether, 7 native species exceed 130 feet,12 native species exceed 120 feet (37 m), and 20 native species exceed 100 feet (30 m) in height.
Of the tall tree champions for Massachusetts, Mohawk Trail State Forest currently boasts 18 champions. However, many of these champion trees are not conspicuously large in girth. They have grown exceptionally tall in the rich, moist, protected ravines of the central Berkshires. Note that what is being described are champion tall trees, which are not to be confused with official state champion trees. The latter are based on weighted measurements of girth, height, and crown spread to arrive at composite scores suggestive of overall size. The national champion sugar maple listed in the National Register of Big Trees grows in the State Forest.
The Mahican-Mohawk Trail and the colonial Mohawk Trail road to the lower meadows both pass through some of the tallest of the pines. The Mahican-Mohawk Recreational Trail passes through some of the old growth as it climbs the Todd-Clark Ridge on the north side.
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Famous quotes containing the word forests:
“A tree is beautiful, but what’s more, it has a right to life; like water, the sun and the stars, it is essential. Life on earth is inconceivable without trees. Forests create climate, climate influences peoples’ character, and so on and so forth. There can be neither civilization nor happiness if forests crash down under the axe, if the climate is harsh and severe, if people are also harsh and severe.... What a terrible future!”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)
“Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?”
—William Blake (1757–1827)
“The civilized nations—Greece, Rome, England—have been sustained by the primitive forests which anciently rotted where they stand. They survive as long as the soil is not exhausted. Alas for human culture! little is to be expected of a nation, when the vegetable mould is exhausted, and it is compelled to make manure of the bones of its fathers. There the poet sustains himself merely by his own superfluous fat, and the philosopher comes down on his marrow-bones.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)