Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1903-06-17
CALIFORNIA; GIANT REDWooDs
Government Is Making Experiments to
Preserve Them.

CALIFORNIA; GIHNl hE1WSobS
Government Is Making Experiments to
Preserve Thorn.
Uncle Sam has been studying the IA
nous big trees and the redwoods OF
California. He has found that the best
of the mighty forests are In the hands
of the lumbermen and will inevitably
be cut down. The gigantic trees are
worth so much money that it is useless
to expect that the owners will let the
forests stand for merely sentimental
reasons
Realizing this, Uncle Sam has tried
experiments to see what could be done
to reproduce them. OF course he has
several national parks now where the
wonderful trees will be preserved as
long as they will live, which may be
for thousands Of years. But that Is
not enough. He wants to preserve al
the forests he can.
Now as a first result Of his study
Uncle Sam has discovered that the
great redwoods can be grown easily
from sprouts and that in thirty years
sprout will grow into a tree eighty
feet high. So by planting trees no"
every time one is cut down, 1t Will be
possible to maintain at least a portion
Of the mammoth trees in all the for
ests of the Pacific coast without inter-
fering with numbering.
Uncle Sam has found out a lot oi
interesting and hitherto unknown
things about redwoods and the big
trees. He finds that the genuine Die
tree is of the same general family as
the redwood, but of different species
The redwood grows higher than any
other American trees, but the DIE
tree beats it in thickness and In age.
On the fiat lands under the best con-
ditions the redwood grows to be as
high as $50 feet, while 225 feet Is Its
maximum height on the slopes. Mos'
of the redwood that is cut Is from 4Ot
to 500 years old. After redwood
reaches an age Of 500 years, 1t begins
to die from the top down. The Oldest
redwood studied was 1873 years old.
The big trees are even older thar
this. Many Of them stood, almost as
great as they are today, while Christ
walked in Galilee.
The redwood resists decay so well
that there are sound trees lying today
in the redwood forests that fell lone
before Columbus discovered America
Through the periods Of Aztec ano
Spaniard, through the American Rev
olution, through the Mexican war tha'
led to the acquisition Of California
these mighty trees lay prone, and they
are sound today. Recently a tree tha'
had fallen 500 years ago, as the for
esters could readily see from certain
surroundings and characteristics, was
taken to a sawmill and it cut up into
slabs just as good and beautifully as
any taken from freshly felled trees
The bark of the redwood offers re-
sistance to fire almost like the door OF
steel safe. It will not burn except
under the fiercest heat
The limits of the sea fogs that drift
over the Pacific coast, make the limits
of the redwood forests. Where the logs
do not reach the redwood forests
cease.
No man can tell what kind Of wood
will come from any redwood tree un-
til he cuts into it. The centuries OF
growth produce so many varying con-
ditions, and each tree meets so many
vicissitudes, that the grain of its wooo
runs extremely uneven. Sometimes
the fibers formed under different rates
Of growth exert so great q tension
among themselves that when the log Is
sawed the wood suddenly gives way
and splits with a report like a shot. :,
The redwood is what foresters call
an "intolerant tree" that is, 1t Will not
tolerate too much shade and, conse-
quently. it cannot get along with other
trees that would rob 1t Of it's sunlight
The seeds of redwoods cannot germi-
nate at all in shady places.
Yet the sprouts that spring up from
Suckers" that is, sprouts that rise
from the fullgrown roots and stems OF
old trees, will thrive under the most
remarkable conditions. The roots are
so strong that they support them and
unlike the seedlings, which would die
without the sun, the sprouts have been
known to grow into saplings eight and
ten feet high in places so dark that no
ray of sunlight ever enters. In some
particularly sombre and damp forests
sprouts have been found growing lus-
tily, although the darkness was SO
great that it had robbed them Of all
color and they were as white as the
sprouts from potatoes, while they had
only few inches of pale, almost yell
low, leaves at the very top.