January 7, 2021

In Search of Old Nova Scotian Trees

Nova Scotia's Acadian Forest has some trees that live a very long time. 300, 400 possibly 500 years.

That's a long time.

With the arrival of European settlements in the early 1600s, forestry has been a big part of our communities. Add some forest fires, hurricanes and bug infestations and many of the Giants are no more.

But there still are individual trees and pockets of big, old trees.

And this project is an effort to record them while they are still living.

Why?

There are many reasons, here are three :

1- Any tree that lives to be over 200 years old probably has good genetic material able to adapt to many changes over its life. And that adaption may prove to be important to our future forests.

2- Trees add a growth ring each year and that ring is an indication of what was happening in their environment that year. So a ring from 1726 from a tree in Yarmouth could be analyzed and an assessment could be made about weather for that location in that year. For example, very helpful if you are trying to corroborate something from oral history

3- In groups, big, old trees form unique ecosystems that support very specific life forms. While about 70% of the province is forested, a very small percentage has big, old trees.

So if you are out there exploring and come across a big one*** get a pic, a location and add it!

***as a guide, try wrapping your arms around the tree. If your fingers don't get half way around you probably have a candidate

Posted on January 7, 2021 12:42 AM by myacadianforest myacadianforest | 0 comments | Leave a comment

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