Cottonwood vies to be among province’s largest trees

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This article was published 27/08/2010 (5816 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

NEAR STE. ADOLPHE — It’s the Odin of trees, the shiver-me-timbers of timber, a tree worthy of Sgt. Joyce Kilmer’s famous line, "I shall never see a poem as lovely as a tree."

Or at least as big. The soaring cottonwood on Kathleen Richardson’s yard along the Red River south of Winnipeg is one-third the height of the Richardson Building.

"Majestic," uttered Ken Fosty, official tree measurer for the Manitoba Forestry Association, as he approached it. Fosty has been travelling the province in search of Manitoba’s largest trees. He has measured 50 so far this year. The Free Press accompanied Fosty as he took official measurements of the Richardson tree.

The first measurement is the dbh, or "diameter at breast height." Fosty measures the circumference with a tape measure that divides circumference by pi to find the diameter (the length across.) The Richardson cottonwood measured 230 centimetres, or seven-and-a-half feet across (about the length of a sheet of plywood).

Next is height and here the Richardson cottonwood excels. It’s as straight and tall as an elite athlete. Fosty peers through an instrument called a hypsometer that informs him the cottonwood is 39 metres tall.

(By now, Kathleen Richardson’s name will have aroused curiosity. She is not the famous benefactor of the local arts scene. This Kathleen has the same name, lives next door to the Richardson family farm, has a husband who works for the Richardson family, but the families are not related. It’s confusing.)

Lastly, Fosty and Richardson measure the crown. This is simply done by unrolling a tape measure diagonally on the ground to measure the tree’s widest reaches. The crown measured 33.8 metres.

The cottonwood’s age could be determined with a special borer that extracts a core sample for counting tree rings. But the cottonwood is just too large. "We don’t have anything big enough to hit the pith (centre)," said Fosty.

He estimates the Richardson cottonwood is 140 years old. He said it could easily live another 100 years. "These cottonwoods are long-lived and majestic and no disease affects them. They don’t have a Dutch elm disease or a spruce bud worm," Fosty said.

This cottonwood is also male, meaning it doesn’t shed snowballs of cotton-wrapped seed every summer.

Fosty is not only measuring for largest tree. He’s also looking for largest trees according to types and trees noteworthy in other ways, including heritage. He recently measured a tree in The Pas believed to be the northernmost scrub oak. He is revising MFA’s book, Heritage Trees of Manitoba, published in 1987.

The challengers for largest tree are coming from Morden where the cottonwoods grow gigantic. Morden has a longer growing season and very fertile soils.

The cottonwood in Morden’s Confederation Park was thought to be Manitoba’s largest tree, after a lightning strike burned down the previous title holder.

But two larger cottonwoods in the Morden area have emerged. One located beside Dead Horse Creek has a dbh of 245 cm, and another 236 cm.

That would make them one-two and the Richardson cottonwood third because the forestry sector bases "largest" solely on dbh.

Kathleen was pleased to learn the dimensions of her cottonwood but wondered if there shouldn’t be an aggregate figure that combines dbh, height and crown. The fact the Richardson cottonwood is 15 metres higher than the Morden trees is not considered.

The shame is that few people can see her cottonwood. The only way for the public to view it is from the river. It is just north of where the Seine River Diversion meets the Red, on the west side.

People with an exceptional tree should contact the MFA at www.thinktrees.org and click on "heritage trees."

bill.redekop@freepress.mb.ca