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Big Trees

In thinking back to my childhood and the tree that I remember the best, it was the huge Eastern Cottonwood that grew on my mother’s home place on Vliet Street in Kewaunee. When my Grandpa Skala died and Grandma Skala had to sell the home, it was only a few years later that the new owners had the tree cut down. They complained that the cottony material surrounding the seeds (yes, it was a female tree) got caught in the window and door screens of the home and presented problems and extra work.

In previous years, every time we were returning to town by car from the north on State Highway 42, as soon as the Kewaunee River, marsh and city came into view, we’d look for the towering Skala cottonwood looming over all other structures and trees in the entire city. That tree was the champ. I think we all cried the day it was cut down.

When the day came that my dad’s doctor ordered him to stop watching Green Bay Packer football games on television, simply because he became too excited and his heart couldn’t stand the strain, he and I spent a good many Sunday afternoons searching the countryside and various friends’ woods for big trees to measure. Today, I fondly look back at those wonderful Sunday adventures because that’s really what got me started in assessing and expanding my interest in trees.

This past Sunday, Sept. 2, turned out to be a record Sunday for our tree study. The day before, Charlotte led a mushroom hike on Washington Island, sponsored by the Island Art and Nature Center. That evening I presented a program, “Wildflowers of the Lily Family,” for the same group, and the following morning I led a nature hike at the Jackson Harbor Ridges. We had been alerted by Washington Island readers of my nature stories in the Peninsula Pulse of two large trees on the island that warranted measuring.

We had plenty of time before catching the ferry back to Northport, so with the help of Steve Waldron, science teacher at the island school and one of the people who found a large tree, we decided to measure both specimens before getting lunch. First we went to the home of Richard Westring and Jo Hagen along Airport Road to check out their Horsechestnut. One glance at the venerable giant, and we were truly astounded. So help me, I kept saying to myself, “new state record, new state record,” under my breath.

Roy Lukes, Jo Hagen and Steve Waldron at the new state champion Horsechestnut tree on Washington Island.

Even though the tree lost one of its large branches a few years ago, and its height of 62 feet isn’t unusually great for this species, its diameter (measured at 4.5 feet above the ground) is 15 feet, equal to 180 inches. In addition, the tree has a very large crown spread. The former state champion Horsechestnut growing in Oshkosh has a height of 70 feet and a circumference of 12 feet 6.5 inches, or 150.5 inches. What a pleasure it was informing Richard and Jo that they very likely are the proud owners of Wisconsin’s number one, state champion Horsechestnut tree. Even though the tree’s statistics have not been reported to the DNR Forestry people yet, I’m positive the new record measurements will be accepted.

Next, we headed down Airport Road for a short distance to the woods owned by Pat Goodman. The first thing that came to mind as we got our initial sighting of the Ironwood tree was that it was a so-called “wolf tree,” judging by the enormous number of branches stretching symmetrically outward in all directions from the trunk. What a gorgeous tree!

A “wolf tree” contains an inordinately large number of branches, far greater than is usual for a normal tree. Old-time loggers said these trees “wolfed” far too much energy and moisture from the earth and, as a result, were harming all surrounding trees, depriving them of enough nutrients and water for proper growth. So down the wolf trees would come.

Nick Anderson stands beside an old “wolf pine.”

Due to the outward taper of the trunk, and some of the lowest branches situated below the prescribed 4.5-foot mark for measuring, I had to measure the circumference slightly below that number. The circumference of that Ironwood is seven feet two inches, or 86 inches, and its height is 47 feet. The tree’s average crown spread is also very wide for an Ironwood. The present state record Ironwood tree is in Green County and has a circumference of 58.8 inches and a height of 65 feet. I’m relatively sure that the Airport Road Ironwood on Washington Island will also be a state record – two new state record trees measured within one hour!

A few weeks ago our friend Gary Schulze asked us if we had ever measured the huge American Beech tree situated below his home and near the base of the bluff at the Door County Land Trust’s White Cliff Fen. Our answer being no, we soon made plans with Dottie Klepp and Gary to hike in to measure the American Beech.

Dottie Klepp hugs the huge Wally Klepp Memorial American Beech tree.

Several years ago, Dottie and her husband Wally donated some of their land in the White Cliff Fen, across from their home, to the Door County Land Trust. Wally used to spend much time communing with nature near that tree before he passed away. Today, that American Beech is known as the Wally Klepp Memorial Beech Tree. Nick Anderson, Marc Savard and I measured the huge towering tree to learn that it is 89 feet tall, has a very wide average crown spread and a trunk circumference of 8 feet three inches, or 99 inches. To the best of my knowledge, the tree should rank as approximately the eighth or ninth largest American Beech in Wisconsin. What’s so wonderful is that when you return to the small parking lot along White Cliff Road and look back, you see the crown of that great memorial tree towering over all other neighboring trees.

Today whenever we approach Institute, the location of Sevastopol School, we suddenly see looming in the distance our county’s largest tree, the Eastern Cottonwood right along State Highway 57 and next to the Institute Saloon. What a colossal monument, 114 feet tall and a little over 22 feet around, to remind me of my Grandpa and Grandma Skala’s Kewaunee cottonwood and how it firmly got my love for trees to start growing!