Pining for a forest retreat? The breathtaking tree houses that run rings around homes back on solid ground

By Louise Boyle
From: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/

Dense foliage and an abundance of species means that the Northwest of America has seen increasing numbers of tree houses popping up in its canopies. 


Far from being the projects of adventurous children, these structures are breathtaking works of architectural beauty in their own right. 

Many of the lofty homes have been created by Pete Nelson a renowned tree house builder who lives in Fall City, Washington and has written several books on the subject.

Temple of the Blue Moon: Tree house expert Pete Nelson built this structure on his land in Fall City, Washington 

Most of the tree houses are complete with running water, flushing toilets and electricity. There are also special touches including hot tubs, zip lines, spiral slides, lookout towers and even an iron bridge. 


Although tree houses often function as workshops, studios or places for entertaining, there are some people who live their lives permanently above solid ground.

 

Gus Guenther, 28, lives all year round in a one-room tree house, 12ft by 16ft, in a small community in south-central Alaska. 


It's hardly luxurious with a propane lamp and wood stove but is perfect for those who enjoy a simple lifestyle.

House of imagination: Trillium, another structure at Nelson's Treehouse Point, perches on a giant western red cedar and can be reached by a spiral staircase

Luxurious decor: The inside of a tree house near Seattle mirrors its surroundings with plenty of light and natural products

Walk this way: This tree house in Washington state has a full-scale steel bridge and is supported by two Douglas fir trees

Mr Guenther, who is originally from Pennsylvania, has said: 'Why wait until you're 65 to retire when you can live this way all your life?'

Earlier this year a film entitled Out On A Limb was made about David 'Squirrelman' Csaky, a homeless man who came to global attention after Seattle authorities evicted him from the elaborate tree house he had been living in on city property for two years. 

After he was evicted from his self-constructed, 300 sq ft home, 52-year-old Mr Csaky's neighbours were so outraged by his treatment that they clubbed together to buy him a motor home to live in.

There are several construction methods when it comes to crafting a home in the trees.
Some can be supported by stilts and don't need the tree to take any of the stress of building materials. 


Rope and cable are the most common methods of suspension tree houses but these are among the most difficult to construct and access.

Thinking outside the box: The Treehotel, which recently opened 40 miles south of the Arctic Circle in Sweden is almost invisible among the trunks

Perfect hideaway: The glass cube is constructed from sustainably harvested wood and have underfloor heating 

Not so square: The six trendy units in Sweden have been created by uber cool architects Tham & Videgard

Cute cabin: This Issaquah treehouse has a long staircase which descend to a hot tub deck and zip line platform

Alpine living: The 450 sq ft house was designed in a Swiss chalet style, with a ramp for older people, instead of the usual stairs or ladder

In Europe and the U.S., recreational tree houses, for entertaining and as workshops and studios, have become increasingly popular thanks to higher disposable incomes, better technology for builders and growing interest in eco-friendly lifestyles. 
 
In other parts of the world, tree houses are part of a more traditional way of life. Stilt houses line the banks of many tropical river valleys in South America, particularly in the Amazon and Orinoco.

Thai stilt houses are built on freshwater, for example lotus ponds. In Vietnam, the homes are built in a similar style expect with a smaller front door due to religious reasons. 

Steep climb: Flat shoes are advisable when it comes to living in the canopies

Having a ball: Free Spirit Spheres on Vancouver Island, Canada are suspended with webs of rope and can be rented by visitors 

Free as a bird: The spheres sway gently in the breeze and are suspended 10 ft above the forest floor

Cabin fever: Inside one of the Free Spirit Spheres on Vancouver Island 

Kelong, are primarily fishing huts, but can double as offshore homes in other parts of Asia like the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore.

Although tree houses appeal to many people's childhood dreams, they have also been used effectively by protest communities.

Tree sitting is often employed by environmentalists against big corporations to prevent road building or the destruction of forests. 


Julia Butterfly Hill is a particularly well-known tree sitter who occupied a Californian Redwood for 738 days in 1997, saving the tree and others in the immediate area.

Live Oaks, Oak Alley Plantation, Vacherie, Louisiana

http://www.oakalleyplantation.com/visiting/photo+gallery/

Best Treehouse Ever!!

From: http://i.imgur.com/

Incredible Tree Climbing Dog

Uploaded by FunnyADay on Jun 21, 2011

The little guy is trained better than any puppy I know.

Free iPhone App Identifies Tree Leaves

By Wired UK

By Mark Brown, Wired UK

A new iPhone app called LeafSnap is a field guide for tech-friendly naturalists. It can identify a tree’s species by analyzing a photograph of its leaf.

Point your smartphone’s camera at one of nature’s solar cells (laid out flat on a white piece of paper) and the app will go to work. It separates the leaf from the background, and then analyzes the leaf’s shape.

The algorithm, designed by facial recognition experts at Columbia University and the University of Maryland, gets measurements from numerous points along the leaf’s outline. These are then compared to an encyclopedic database of leaves — kindly donated by the Smithsonian Institution and non-profit nature-photography group Finding Species — to give you a result.

If it isn’t completely sure, it will show you an entire collection of possible leafy matches. You can then look at more information on those trees — finding out where they grow, what time of the year their flowers bloom and pictures of their fruits, seeds and bark — to make a proper decision on what type of leaf you’ve got in front of you.

The app also has a dabble in citizen science. Once you’ve correctly labeled your leaf you can tap “label,” which uploads your data to a community of scientists. Your data will be geo-tagged to your current location, letting flora experts map and monitor the ebb and flow of different trees.

Unfortunately for nature geeks (or shape recognition nerds) in the U.K., you’ll probably have trouble getting the app to identify Britain’s native leaves. LeafSnap currently includes the trees of just New York City and Washington D.C. A full rollout covering the United States is planned, but there are no promises for overseas trees.

Android and iPad versions of the app are planned for this summer. In the meantime, download the free iPhone app.

Image: Dave Mosher/Wired.com

Source: Wired.co.uk

Sequoias – The Ancient Giants [14 Great Pics]

Sequoias in the fog at King’s Canyon National Park. May 24, 2008 (Photo used under Creative Commons from henryalien).

triggerpit.com — The worlds largest trees (in volume). They can live up to 3000 years. Magnificent, mysterious and gigantic

 

Click here for the Amazing Gallery: http://triggerpit.com/2010/09/20/sequoia-the-ancient-giants/

Almost invisible mirrored tree house built in Sweden

By Lloyd Alter, TreeHugger
From: http://green.yahoo.com/

They said it couldn't be done. When we first wrote about the almost invisible tree house to be built in Sweden by Tham & Videgard, 899 commenters thought it was computer-generated eye candy, impossible to build, and death for birds.

But the architects built it, one of six units in a "Treehotel," which recently opened 40 miles south of the Arctic Circle in Sweden.

The four-meter glass cube looks as spectacular in reality as it did in the rendering. Kent Lindvall, co-owner of the TreeHotel, has been quoted as saying:

Everything will reflect in this -- the trees, the birds, the clouds, the sun, everything. So it should be invisible nearly in the forest.

And what about the birds? According to Designboom, Lindvall says that a special film that is visible to birds will be applied to the glass.

The units are constructed from sustainably harvested wood and have electric radiant floor heating and "a state-of-the-art, eco-friendly, incineration toilet"

(Although I've owned an incinerating toilet, and it wasn't that eco-friendly. It used a lot of electricity and created noise and some smells. But perhaps they've improved.)

But other than that minor quibble, this appears to be a truly "eco" resort. The owners say in Designboom:

"This is untouched forest, and we want to maintain it the same way. We decided, for example, to not offer snowmobile safari which is very common up here," says Selberg. Instead, wilderness walks will be offered.

Where do I sign up?

All photos courtesy of Tham & Videgard.

A Tree That Bleeds Red Sap: The Dragon’s Blood Tree

By: Dahlia Rideout
From: http://www.divinecaroline.com/

The Dragon’s Blood tree (Dracaena Cinnabari) is a rare type of tree originating in Socotra archipelago, a small group of four islands in the Indian Ocean. Also known as the “Galápagos of the Indian Ocean,” the group of islands is host to a number of fascinating species.
Found in many surrounding areas, including mainland Yemen, the tree contains a marvelously red resin called Dragon’s Blood, which has been used for a variety of purposes throughout history. Starting in the first century AD, Dragon’s Blood was used as a dye and medicine to treat respiratory and gastrointestinal problems. Image Source: Stefan Geens (cc)

Later uses include a blood coagulant and treatments for diarrhea, fever, dysentery, ulcers in the mouth, throat, intestines and stomach, as well as an antiviral for respiratory viruses. Image Source: The Wren Design
Dragon’s Blood also has a history in ritual magic and alchemy. Apparently Dragon’s Blood can increase the potency of neopagan witchcraft spells for protection, love, banishing, and sexuality. Image Source: Andy Dingley (cc)

Often touted as “red rock opium,” the resin is often sold as a narcotic, although its effects are mild at best when smoked. Image Source: Stefan Geens (cc)
The bizarre shape of the blood tree helps it survive arid conditions and areas with limited soil. The shading helps the seedlings survive in the harsh environment. Image Source: Boris Khvostichenko (cc)

The Most Colourful Tree on Earth

Written by Simone Preuss
From: http://www.environmentalgraffiti.com/

Photo: Jeff Kubina
Rainbow Eucalyptus (Eucalyptus deglupta)

The Rainbow Eucalyptus (Eucalyptus deglupta) or Mindanao Gum is the only species of Eucalyptus tree found in the northern hemisphere. As if that weren’t extraordinary enough, the up to 70-m tall tree also shines in the colours of the rainbow: its bark can take on a yellow, green, orange and even purple shading!

Nope, no crazy abstract painter has put a paint brush to this tree:

Photo: Lisa Jacobs

The unusual phenomenon is caused by patches of bark shedding at different times. The different colours are therefore indicators of the age of the bark: Freshly shed outer bark will reveal the bright green inner bark. This darkens over time and changes from blue to purple and then reaches orange and maroon tones.

Like a natural camouflage pattern:

Photo: carvalho

One would think that a tree this pretty and unusual should, well, if not be worshipped, at least be put on public display in parks and forests. Sadly, that is not the case. Rainbow Eucalyptus trees are cultivated around the world mainly for pulpwood creation purposes. Wood pulp is the most common ingredient when making paper, white paper that is. The pulp can be chemically or mechanically separated from the wood. It is a dry, fibrous material whose fibres disperse and become more pliable when suspended in water.

Rainbow Eucalyptus trees at the side of Hana Highway in Maui, Hawaii:

Photo: Forest & Kim Starr

Pulpwood’s here to stay though as it is considered a source of green energy, and demand has increased over the last few years. Currently though, trees cultivated specifically for pulp production account for only 16% of world pulp production. About 9% comes from old growth forests and the remaining 75% from second-, third- and more generation forests. That’s a lot of tree years wasted for a bit of pulpwood! However, reforestation and specific cultivation for pulp wood purposes are on the rise, making the trees a renewable energy.

Colourful wonder:

Photo: Amelia

If you want to spot a Rainbow Eucalyptus tree live and in all its glory, you’ll have to travel to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea or the Philippines, the tree’s only native places. However, it has been introduced worldwide as an exotic wood in South America, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, China and other countries.

Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4

© Simone Preuss

Giant Redwood, in full for the first time

i.imgur.com — Nick Nichols, the “Indiana Jones of Photography," produced the first-ever high-definition, seamless composite photo of an entire redwood. It’s 300 feet tall and between 1,500 and 2,000 years old. The photo was created with 84 very high-resolution images, taken at approximately 3-foot intervals from a vertical dolly rigged parallel to the tree.

Click here for this fantastic image: Giant Redwood, in full for the first time (PIC)

The photographer is Nick Nichols and the photos were in the Oct 2009 National Geographic. Here is an article one it (it took 3 weeks just to build the rigging):
http://www.savetheredwoods.org/redwoodtransect/nic ...

and video:
http://techblips.dailyradar.com/video/redwoods-the ...

...and if you want to buy a 6-foot print for $200 :P
http://gallery.pictopia.com/natgeo/photo/8389209/

When the land's worth more than the trees

By Amy Hsuan, The Oregonian

From: http://www.oregonlive.com/
December 26, 2009, 9:00PM
Part one of two



Torsten Kjellstrand, The Oregonian Travis Miller works on his family’s ranch near Glenwood, Wash., just southeast of Mount Adams. While many make a living in the woods in the area, Miller’s family also depends on forests, where their cattle pasture in the summers. Last year, Miller was one of several people from the area who traveled with the nonprofit Mount Adams Resource Stewards to New England to see how community forests work. GLENWOOD, Wash. -- For 100 years, Ponderosa pines nourished this logging town of 500 nestled along Mount Adams' southeastern flank. But in the past few years, a change has taken over the woods, unsettling residents and their relationship with the land.

Here and throughout the Pacific Northwest, investors have been buying millions of acres of forestland, betting on big payouts for their clients -- pension funds, university endowments and foundations.

Today, timber investment management organizations and real estate investment trusts represent the largest private landowners in Oregon and across the country.

Over the past decade, investor-owners have used one big advantage as they've quietly replaced traditional forest products companies: They don't pay corporate taxes. This month,Weyerhaeuser, the nation's last major publicly-traded integrated forest products company, announced it will become a real estate investment trust next year.



Torsten Kjellstrand, The Oregonian The nonprofit Mount Adams Resource Stewards has found ways to tap the forests for new products and more work for residents. In 2007, the nonprofit raised $300,000 from private and federal grants to create a new business out of low-value, small-diameter wood from forests surrounding Glenwood, Wash. With timber prices flatlining and real estate values rising, many private forestland owners are shifting their gaze to building homes rather than growing trees. Landowners elsewhere in the country, under pressure to maximize returns, have looked to convert forests into subdivisions and resorts as trees become less valuable than the land they occupy.

The unprecedented change in land ownership raises concerns about the impact on wildlife and natural resources, as well as the increased costs of protecting residents from forest fires. Nationwide, about 1 million acres of forestland are lost to development every year. In the Pacific Northwest, it begs the question: What does the future for forestry look like in a region defined by it?

In timber-dependent towns like Glenwood, the change carries the fear of the unknown. As landowners come and go quickly, their financial decisions could create a patchwork of forests and rural sprawl.


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"Without the land, there's nothing here," says forester Jay McLaughlin, who lives in Glenwood. "If we don't keep places like this going, they're going to end up being playgrounds for the rich or turn into ghost towns."

Investors take root
Institutional investment in timberland nationwide soared from $1 billion in 1990 to $40 billion in 2007, according to Yale University and other sources.

"When I first started in this business in the '90s, my job was as a missionary trying to explain why forestlands were a good investment," says Matt Donegan, co-founder of Forest Capital Partners, one of the nation's largest timber investment management organizations, which has a Portland office. "Now, people are seeking me out."

Between 1996 and 2007, 84 percent of the nation's 70 million acres of privately-owned industrial forests changed hands, according to a survey by Portland-based consultants U.S. Forest Capital.

"It's an astonishing rate," says Tom Tuchmann, the firm's president and a former adviser on timber issues to President Bill Clinton. "Increasingly, we're seeing even more parceling off."

Starting in the 1990s, federal limits on logging to protect wildlife species cut off a major supply of timber in the Pacific Northwest. With the constricted supply, timber prices shot up and private forests rose in value.

But as the bulky timber giants found themselves losing ground to competitors from Argentina to New Zealand, they narrowed their focus to operating mills and manufacturing wood products. In Oregon, timberland owners such as Boise Cascade and Georgia Pacific sold all their land -- hundreds of thousands of acres. Others fell into bankruptcy.

Wall Street snapped up the properties. Pension funds, endowments and foundations found timber to be a safe place to park billions of dollars as a hedge against inflation. Since 1986, timberlands generated annualized returns of 14.5 percent, according to the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries' Timberland Property Index.

Insurance and title companies, which invest policyholder premiums to generate returns, also opened real estate divisions. Fidelity National Financial, based in Florida, now owns 520,000 acres of Oregon forestland.

Around Glenwood, Hancock Timber Resource Group, a subsidiary of Manulife Financial Corp., is now the largest landowner. It owns a half-million acres across Washington and 140,000 acres in Oregon.

"Over the years, in order to maintain the insurance business, we've had to learn how to manage money," says John Davis, acquisitions manager for Hancock, which has an office in Vancouver. "There's a duality to the business."


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A jigsaw forest

From a bird's-eye view, one owner's land is indistinguishable from the next. But on a map, the roughly 111,000 acre tract formerly known as the Klickitat tree farm, looks like a jigsaw puzzle. The property has seen more landowners since 2000 than in the entire 20th century. In the past, long-time wood products companies like St. Regis, Champion and International Paper logged the forest 25 years at a time.

Now, investor-owners sell parcels every two years. In 2007, a group of six investors bought 82,000 acres. Last fall, one of the investors sold his 12,300 acres to another investment firm, now the sixth owner of the property.

"What happens when you chop the land into little chunks?" says George Hathaway, a former rancher who grew up in Glenwood. "You don't have a forest anymore."

Timber investment management organizations and real estate investment trusts, which have expanded like wildfire, have been hit by the recession along with others in the forest products industry. They wield a fundamental advantage: They don't pay corporate taxes, which range up to 35 percent. Instead, their shareholders or investors pay capital gains taxes of 15 percent based on dividends.

This month, Weyerhaeuser's board of directors approved the company's transition to a real estate investment trust for those reasons, says Bruce Amundson, spokesman for the Federal Way, Wash.-based company.

Clark Binkley, managing director of Boston-based International Forest Investment Advisors, says the tax advantages for investors have made it hard for companies to compete.

"Nobody said 'we don't want to have any integrated forest products companies,'" he says. "But now it's basically impossible to operate an integrated forest products company in the U.S."


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When it comes to big-ticket purchases, investment managers can raise millions of dollars through their investors, while companies must go to the bank and pay interest. Plum Creek Timber, based in Seattle, converted to a public real estate investment trust in 1999. Today, it's the nation's largest private landowner with more than 7 million acres, including 430,000 in Oregon.

"The primary reason why Plum Creek became a real estate investment trust was so we could gain access to capital to grow the company," says spokeswoman Kathy Budinick.

In Oregon, privately-held family-owned companies still hold millions of acres. But they don't have the same purchasing power.

"The timber investment management organizations can go to their investors and raise $100 million with no debt, no interest," says Steven Zika, CEO of Portland-based Hampton Affiliates, a family-owned company with 85,000 acres in Oregon. "Within the last five years, we couldn't make enough cash from selling logs to make the interest payment."

Tough economics
Jay McLaughlin's first glimpse of Glenwood was on a calendar, which lured him and his wife here for teaching jobs in 1998. McLaughlin left to earn a degree in forestry from Yale University in 2000, then moved right back.

The 37-year-old worries about the fate of the town, less than an hour from Hood River. Its mill closed in 1927.

"What's the future for a place like Glenwood?" McLaughlin asks.



Glenwood’s mill closed in 1927, but the town has long been dependent on the forests for economic survival. Today, logging and forestry continue to be a major source of employment through investment managers who have purchased timber land with cash from institutional investors. In the past, traditional companies owned land to supply timber to their mills. They invested in research to find more efficient ways to grow trees, their primary business.

Investment managers have an objective to maximize returns for their investors. And as the timber industry grows tougher, selling land for development has become an opportunity for all forest owners. In industry talk, it's called "higher and better use."

A growing gap in the economics of timber versus housing development ramps up the pressure. The going price for property at timber value in Oregon is $2,000 to $4,000 an acre. If it's sold as a home site, it's worth $30,000 an acre.

"There's a greater pressure to maximize returns and to find alternative revenue," says Ray Wilkinson, executive director of Oregon Forest Industries Council, a trade group that represents the state's largest private landowners. "The new ownership structure has investor expectations that are different from traditional forest products companies."

But hard times for the past several years mean even family-owned companies feel pushed in that direction.

"It takes 40 to 50 years to grow a tree," says Zika, of Hampton Affiliates. "With the recession, it's tough to resist selling a tract. We do more of it in tougher times."

In Oregon, where land use laws prohibit much development in forestlands, the pace of it has been far slower than elsewhere. In Montana, large homes speckle forests. In Washington, the loss of forests has been 10 times faster than Oregon, according to preliminary studies by the Oregon Department of Forestry.

Homes still crop up in Oregon. Between 2000 and 2005, more than 6,000 homes were built on land zoned for forest uses. With more people living in the woods, some worry about the cost of fighting wildfires, most of which are caused by humans. The closer the fires are to homes, the more expensive they are to fight.

"It's going to be a slow filling-in," says Gary Lettman, economist for the forestry department. "But if you put a house out there, it's going to be much more difficult to manage for wildlife and forestry."

Buying a forest
In Glenwood, a handful of new homes has sprung up, but the newcomers highlight a bind for rural communities. They bring fresh faces, but with second homes, they tend to visit only on weekends or holidays.

Across the country, development in forests forges once-unimaginable alliances between conservationists and the forest products industry. Now, the two sides work together to preserve "working" forests, pitching for financial rewards for tree-growing.

Biomass energy markets, which will make use of waste wood, and tax incentives for providing wildlife habitat, clean water and air could soon be on the horizon.

In Minnesota, forestland owners are paid recreation access fees of $8 an acre, which means $2.5 million a year for Forest Capital Partners, which owns 300,000 acres there.



Torsten Kjellstrand, The OregonianThe Shade Tree Inn is one of two main businesses in Glenwood, which has lost many businesses over the years as the forest products industry has declined. The inn’s restaurant serves as a defacto community center for the town. "Sometimes the gap between development and timber is too big," says Donegan, who hopes to see trees become more viable. "But we have to ensure our working forests are going to survive and we need to find a way to give forestland owners some rewards."

In 2003, McLaughlin started a nonprofit, the Mount Adams Resource Stewards. At Yale, he learned about communities in New England buying forests. Last year, he took a group of residents from the surrounding area to explore several projects in Maine.

"It really opened my eyes," says Hathaway, who sits on the nonprofit's board. "If we can buy this land, we can keep that money right here in Glenwood, and it doesn't have to go to Wall Street."

The new landowner around town is a timber investment management organization called Conservation Forestry, which sells lands to interested nonprofits -- a rising trend and a new opportunity for Glenwood. But to buy a forest, McLaughlin will have to come up with a lot of money.

"Everything has to be on the table right now," he says. "There is so much land changing hands, there's pretty radical things happening on the landscape. We need pretty bold ideas."

Amy Hsuan: 503-294-5137

10 Most Magnificent Trees in the World.

Posted by Alex in Neatorama Only

"A tree is a wonderful living organism which gives shelter, food,
warmth and protection to all living things. It even gives shade to
those who wield an axe to cut it down" – Buddha.

There are probably hundreds of majestic and magnificent trees in the world – of these, some are particularly special:

10. Lone Cypress in Monterey

(Image credit: bdinphoenix [flickr])

(Image credit: mikemac29 [flickr])

Buffeted by the cold Pacific Ocean wind, the scraggly Lone Cypress [wiki] (Cupressus macrocarpa) in Pebble Beach, Monterey Peninsula, California, isn’t a particularly large tree. It makes up for its small size, however, with its iconic status as a stunningly beautiful tree in splendid isolation, framed by an even more beautiful background of the Pacific Ocean.

9. Circus Trees

As a hobby, bean farmer Axel Erlandson [wiki] shaped trees – he pruned, bent, and grafted trees into fantastic shapes and called them "Circus Trees." For example, to make this "Basket Tree" arborsculpture, Erlandson planted six sycamore trees in a circle and then grafted them together to form the diamond patterns.

Basket Tree (Image credit: jpeepz [flickr])

The two-legged tree (Image credit: Vladi22, Wikipedia)

Ladder tree (Image credit: Arborsmith)

Axel Erlandson underneath one of his arborsculpture (Image credit: Wilma Erlandson, Cabinet Magazine)

Erlandson was very secretive and refused to reveal his methods on how to grow the Circus Trees (he even carried out his graftings behind screens to protect against spies!) and carried the secrets to his grave.

The trees were later bought by millionaire Michael Bonfante, who transplanted them to his amusement park Bonfante Gardens in Gilroy in 1985.

8. Giant Sequoias: General Sherman

(Image credit: Humpalumpa [flickr])

Giant Sequoias [wiki] (Sequoiadendron giganteum), which only grow in Sierra Nevada, California, are the world’s biggest trees (in terms of volume). The biggest is General Sherman [wiki] in the Sequoia National Park – one behemoth of a tree at 275 feet (83.8 m), over 52,500 cubic feet of volume (1,486 m³), and over 6000 tons in weight.

General Sherman is approximately 2,200 years old – and each year, the tree adds enough wood to make a regular 60-foot tall tree. It’s no wonder that naturalist John Muir said "The Big Tree is Nature’s forest masterpiece, and so far as I know, the greatest of living things."

For over a century there was a fierce competition for the title of the largest tree: besides General Sherman, there is General Grant [wiki] at King’s Canyon National Park, which actually has a
larger circumference (107.5 feet / 32.77 m vs. Sherman’s 102.6 feet / 31.27 m).

In 1921, a team of surveyors carefully measured the two
giants – with their data, and according to the complex American Forestry Association system of judging a tree, General Grant should have been award the title of largest tree – however, to simplify the matter, it was later determined that in this case, volume, not point system, should be the determining factor.

7. Coast Redwood: Hyperion and Drive-Thru Trees

There is another sequoia species (not to be confused with Giant Sequoia) that is quite remarkable: the Coast Redwood [wiki] (Sequoia sempervirens), the tallest trees in the world.

The reigning champion is a tree called Hyperion in the Redwood National Park, identified by researcher Chris Atkins and amateur naturalist Michael Taylor in 2006. Measuring over 379 feet (155.6 115 m) tall, Hyperion beat out the previous record holder Stratosphere Giant [wiki] in the Humboldt Redwoods State Park (at 370 feet / 112.8 m).

The scientists aren’t talking about the exact location of Hyperion: the terrain is difficult, and they don’t want a rush of visitors to come and trample the tree’s root system.

[Image: The Stratosphere Giant - still an impressive specimen, previously the world's tallest tree until dethroned by Hyperion in 2006.]

That’s not all that’s amazing about the Coast Redwood: there are four giant California redwoods big enough that you can drive your car through them!

The most famous of the drive-through trees is the Chandelier Tree [wiki] in Leggett, California. It’s a 315 foot tall redwood tree, with a 6 foot wide by 9 foot tall hole cut through its base in the 1930s.

Chandelier Tree. (Image credit: hlh-abg [flickr])

6. Chapel-Oak of Allouville-Bellefosse

Chapel-Oak of Allouville-Bellefosse (Image credit: Old trees in Netherlands & Europe)

(Image credit: dm1795 [flickr])

(Image credit: Luc Doudet)

The Chêne-Chapelle (Chapel-Oak) of Allouville-Bellefosse is the most famous tree in France – actually, it’s more than just a tree: it’s a building and a religious monument all in one.

In 1669, l’Abbe du Detroit and du Cerceau decided to build a chapel in (at that time) a 500 years old or so oak (Quercus robur) tree made hollow by a lightning bolt. The priests built a small altar to the Virgin Mary. Later on, a second chapel and a staircase were added.

Now, parts of the tree are dead, the crown keeps becoming smaller and smaller every year, and parts of the tree’s bark, which fell off due to old age, are covered by protective oak shingles. Poles and cables support the aging tree, which in fact, may not live much longer. As a symbol, however, it seems that the Chapel-Oak of Allouville-Bellefosse may live on forever.

5. Quaking Aspen: Pando (The Trembling Giant)

Quaking Aspen (Image: Wikipedia)

Aspen grove (Image credit: scottks1 [flickr])

Quaking Aspen in winter (Image credit: darkmatter [flickr])

Pando [wiki] or the Trembling Giant in Utah is actually a colony of a single Quaking Aspen (Populus tremuloides) tree. All of the trees (technically, "stems") in this colony are genetically identical (meaning, they’re exact clones of one another). In fact, they are all a part of a single living organism with an enormous underground root system.

Pando, which is Latin for "I Spread," is composed of about 47,000 stems spread throughout 107 acres of land. It estimated to weigh 6,600 tons, making it the heaviest known organism. Although the average age of the individual stems are 130 years, the entire organism is estimated to be about 80,000 years old!

4. Montezuma Cypress: The Tule Tree

The Tule Tree Towers over a church next to it (Image credit: jubilohaku [flickr])

Full width of the Tule Tree (Image credit: Gengiskanhg, Wikipedia)

Close-up of the tree’s gnarled trunk. Local legends say that you can make out animals like jaguars and elephants in the trunk, giving the tree the nickname of "the Tree of Life" (Image credit: jvcluis [flickr])

El Árbol del Tule [wiki] ("The Tule Tree") is an especially large Montezuma cypress (Taxodium mucronatum) near the city of Oaxaca, Mexico. This tree has the largest trunk girth at 190 feet (58 m) and trunk diameter at 37 feet (11.3 m). The Tule tree is so thick that people say you don’t hug this tree, it hugs you instead!

For a while, detractors argued that it was actually three trees masquerading as one – however, careful DNA analysis confirmed that it is indeed one magnificent tree.

In 1994, the tree (and Mexican pride) were in jeopardy: the leaves were sickly yellow and there were dead branches everywhere- the tree appeared to be dying. When tree "doctors" were called in, they diagnosed the problem as dying of thirst. The prescription? Give it water. Sure enough, the tree soon recovered after a careful watering program was followed.

3. Banyan Tree: Sri Maha Bodhi Tree

The Banyan tree is named after "banians" or Hindu traders who carry out their business under the tree. Even if you have never heard of a Banyan tree (it was the tree used by Robinson Crusoe for his treehouse), you’d still recognize it. The shape of the giant tree is unmistakable: it has a majestic canopy with aerial roots running from the branches to the ground.

Banyan tree (Image credit: Diorama Sky [flickr])

Closer view of the Banyan aerial root structure (Image credit: BillyCrafton [flickr])

If you were thinking that the Banyan tree looks like the trees whose roots snake through the ruins of the Ta Prohm temple like tentacles of the jungle (Lara Croft, anyone?) at Ankor, Cambodia , you’d be right!

Banyan tree (or is it silk-cotton tree?) in the ruins of Ta Prohm, Ankor, Cambodia
(Image Credit: Casual Chin [flickr])

One of the most famous species of Banyan, called the Sacred Fig [wiki] or Bo tree, is the Sri Maha Bodhi [wiki] tree in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka. It is said that the tree was grown from a cutting from the original tree under which Buddha became enlightened in the 6th century BC.

Planted in 288 BC, it is the oldest living human-planted tree in the world, with a definitive planting date!

(Image credit: Images of Ceylon)

(Image credit: Wikipedia)

2. Bristlecone Pine: Methuselah and Prometheus, the Oldest Trees in the World.

Methuselah Grove (Image Credit: NOVA Online)

Bristlecone pine grove in which Prometheus grew (Image credit: James R. Bouldin, Wikipedia)

The oldest living tree in the world is a White Mountains, California, bristlecone pine (Pinus longaeva) named Methuselah [wiki], after the Biblical figure who lived to 969 years old. The Methuselah tree, found at 11,000 feet above sea level, is 4,838 years old – it is not only the oldest tree but also the oldest living non-clonal organism in the world.

Before Methuselah was identified as the world’s oldest tree by Edmund Schulman in 1957, people thought that the Giant Sequoias were the world’s oldest trees at about 2,000 years old. Schulman used a borer to obtain a core sample to count the growth rings of various bristlecone pines, and found over a dozen trees over 4,000 years old.

The story of Prometheus [wiki] is even more interesting: in 1964, Donald R. Currey [wiki], then a graduate student, was taking core samples from a tree named Prometheus. His boring tool broke inside the tree, so he asked for permission from the US Forest Service to cut it down and examine the full cross section of the wood. Surprisingly the Forest Service agreed! When they examined the tree, Prometheus turned out to be about 5,000 years old, which would have made it the world’s oldest tree when the scientist unwittingly killed it!

Stump of the Prometheus Tree. (Image Credit: James R. Bouldin, Wikipedia)

Today, to protect the trees from the inquisitive traveler, the authorities are keeping their location secret (indeed, there are no photos identifying Methuselah for fear of vandalism).

1. Baobab

The amazing baobab [wiki] (Adansonia) or monkey bread tree can grow up to nearly 100 feet (30 m) tall and 35 feet (11 m) wide. Their defining characteristic: their swollen trunk are actually water storage – the baobab tree can store as much as 31,700 gallon (120,000 l) of water to endure harsh drought conditions.

Baobab trees are native to Madagascar (it’s the country’s national tree!), mainland Africa, and Australia. A cluster of "the grandest of all" baobab trees (Adansonia grandidieri) can be found in the Baobab Avenue, near Morondava, in Madagascar:

(Image credit: Fox-Talbot, Wikipedia)

(Image credit: plizzba [flickr])

(Image credit: Daniel Montesino [flickr])

In Ifaty, southwestern Madagascar, other baobabs take the form of bottles, skulls, and even teapots:

Teapot baobab (Image credit: Gilles Croissant)

The baobab trees in Africa are amazing as well:

Baobab in Tanzania (Image credit: telethon [flickr])

Baobab near Bulawayo, Zimbabwe (Image credit: ironmanix [flickr])

There are many practical uses of baobab trees, like for a toilet:

A toilet built inside a baobab tree in the Kayila Lodge, Zambia
(Image credit: Steve Makin [flickr])

… and even for a prison:

A "Prison Baob" tree in Western Australia (Image credit: yewenyi [flickr])

Bonus: Tree That Owns Itself

Son of the Tree That Owns Itself (Image Credit: Bloodofox, Wikipedia)

Legend has it that the Tree That Owns Itself [wiki], a white oak in Athens, Georgia was given ownership of itself and the surrounding land by Dr. William Henry Jackson in 1820! The original tree had died long ago, but a new tree (Son of The Tree That Owns Itself) was planted at the same location from one of its acorns.

Bonus 2: The Lonely Tree of Ténéré

The Tree of Ténéré in the 1970s, before a truck crashed into it (Image credit: Peter Krohn)

The Tree of Ténéré or L’Abre du Ténéré was the world’s most isolated tree – the solitary acacia, which grew in the Sahara desert in Niger, Africa, was the only tree within more than 250 miles (400 km) around.

The tree was the last surviving member of a group of acacias that grew when the desert wasn’t as dry. When scientists dug a hole near the tree, they found its roots went down as deep as 120 feet (36 m) below to the water table!

Apparently, being the only tree in that part of the wide-open desert (remember: there wasn’t another tree for 250 miles around), wasn’t enough to stop a drunk Libyan truck driver from driving his truck into it, knocking it down and killing it!

Now, a metal sculpture was placed in its spot to commemorate the Lonely Tree of Ténéré:

(Image credit: Nomad’s Land, main website)

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I’ll be the first to acknowledge that this list is far from complete: there are many more magnificent trees in the world (for instance, see the List of Famous Trees [wiki]). If you have any addition of noteworthy tree (and stories about trees), please leave it in the comment section.