Save-the-Redwoods League

PHOTO BY LARRY ULRICH

Spring Bulletin 2001

2 SAVE-THE-REDWOODS LEAGUE ♦ Spring Bul let in 2001

After months of advocacy by Save-the-Redwoods League, moments before adjourn-

ing the last session of the 106th Congress, theSenate and the House of Representatives voted toexpand the boundary of Sequoia National Park toinclude Dillonwood Grove, approving bills intro-duced by Congressman George Radanovich (R-CA) and Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA). TheLeague appreciates the pro bono services of member and Washington lobbyist Don Masseywho assisted this effort.

Dillonwood’s 1,540 acres comprise 70% ofthe last remaining giant sequoia groves in private ownership. The headwaters of the North Fork ofthe Tule River flow through the rugged granitereaches where trees more than 2000 years oldtower above a healthy multi-aged second growthgiant sequoia forest, unlike any area currently inthe National Park. (See League Bulletin Fall2000).

In late fall, Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)spearheaded the successful campaign to secure a federal appropriation of $5 million towardsDillonwood’s purchase price of $10.3 million.Save-the-Redwoods League must exercise theoption to purchase the Dillonwood Grove byOctober 2001.

Thanks to over 6,500 League members, theDavid and Lucile Packard Foundation and The Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund, over$9.3 million has been raised!

The commitment of so many members is pivotal in engaging government and foundationsupport for Dillonwood. In March, an anony-mous donor offered a $1.5 million challenge tocomplete the project. The League must raise theremaining $1 million to secure this gift and preserve Dillonwood Grove forever.

“This is a significant opportunity to protectthis historic grove of redwoods.The GoldmanFund is glad to be part ofthis partnership betweenthe public and privatesectors. In years to come,our grandchildren andgreat-grandchildren will be grateful for thepreservation of these Giant Sequoias.”

— Richard N. GoldmanPresident of the Richardand Rhoda GoldmanFund

$9.3 million

$10.3 million

California’s 67 giant sequoia groves

Dillonwood Update!

Thank you!

Are You Online? Send us your email address so we can make current news and information available to you!(bulletin@savetheredwoods.org)

In 1931, thirteen years after its founding,Save-the-Redwoods League joined with the

Calaveras Grove Association and the State ParkCommission to purchase a stand of ancientgiant sequoias which became the North Groveof Calaveras State Park. This purchase built onthe protection for the giant sequoia initiated in1864 when President Lincoln gave the giantsequoia trees in the Yosemite area to the Stateof California for public use and recreation. The giant sequoia’s conservation was advanced significantly in 1890 with the creation ofSequoia National Park, the country’s secondnational park.

The magnificent coast redwoods did notenjoy such early protection. Concern for rapidlyadvancing destruction of the primeval coastredwood forest led to the creation of Save-the-Redwoods League in 1918, and remains theprimary focus of the League’s work.

The League’s next significant involvementwith the giant sequoia was the purchase of theSouth Grove at Calaveras in 1954. The Leaguecontributed $1,240,000, the California Depart-ment of Parks and Recreation contributed$1,622,000, and the Calaveras GroveAssociation contributed $72,600 to buy theSouth Grove from a lumber company. Therugged, pristine South Grove was promptlyadded to the Calaveras Big Trees State Park.

In 1986, the League purchased 422 privately-owned acres near the Mineral King Valleydeep within Sequoia National Park for$2,200,000 to avoid sale to a private buyer,who might have used the land in conflict withNational Park policy. The “Kaweah Han”stand included more than 290 giant sequoiatrees larger than six feet and some as large as20 feet in diameter.

In 1999, the owners of the DillonwoodGrove offered to sell their 1,540 acres to theLeague when the Superintendent of SequoiaNational Park expressed great interest in the

grove’s addition to the Parkbut had no funds necessaryfor the purchase.

Passage of the legislationto expand the Park’s bound-ary to include Dillonwoodand securing funding for itspurchase has been a majorfocus of the League’s workfor the last year and a half.

Dillonwood is biologically part of the Park’sGarfield Grove. Together they form one of thefive largest of the 67 giant sequoia groves.When added to the National Park, theDillonwood-Garfield Grove will be managedby a single owner for its permanent protection,safeguarding the bear, mountain lion, deer,spotted owl, pileated woodpecker and goshawkthat live there, and assuring its enjoyment bythe people.

A History of Save-the-RedwoodsLeague and the Giant Sequoia

$1.5 Million Challenge Giftfor Dillonwood

We are thrilled to announce that a $1.5 millionChallenge Gift has been made

to Dillonwood Grove. A very generous benefactor has stepped forward to help spur

the final private contributions needed to complete the purchase of this forest.

Thanks to this Challenge Gift, your gift to Dillonwood today will have twice the impact.

We only have $1 million left to go!

Please help us meet this challenge.

SAVE-THE-REDWOODS LEAGUE ♦ Spring Bul let in 2001 3

A Tree Named LunaIn December 1997, in Humboldt County,

California, twenty-three year old JuliaButterfly Hill ascended an old growth coastredwood to protest Pacific Lumber Company’slogging of our last remaining original forests.She vowed that she would come down onlywhen she could be sure the old growth treewould not be harvested.

After Julia lived in Luna for more than twoyears, several nonprofit groups negotiated asettlement in which Pacific Lumber Companyreceived $50,000 to preserve Luna in a 400-foot circle of forest, in perpetuity.

VANDALISM

Just after Thanksgiving, 2000, I received alate night call from the Executive Director ofSave-the-Redwoods League. I was told Lunahad been slashed with a chainsaw. The nextday, I met in Humboldt County with represen-tatives of Pacific Lumber Company, theCalifornia Department of Forestry, and local

foresters toevaluate dam-ages and brain-storm how bestto stabilizeLuna.

We hikedwith journaliststo the site tomeasure andgraph theinjuries. Luna’suphill side hada charred cavityfrom centuriesof intermittentforest fires.From within the cavity, theslasher hadplunged a

chainsaw’s 36” bar into Luna’s heart, severingover 60 percent of her eleven-foot wide cross-section. Even in a ten mile per hour wind,Luna was rocking slightly at the saw cut. Afierce winter storm was due that night, andcould very well have toppled Luna.

The consulting team devised a plan toinstall plate-steel braces above and below thesaw cut, anchored with lag screws, and boltedtogether like steel stitches. Pacific LumberCompany assigned machinists to work urgentovertime to fabricate five pairs of weldedbraces.

Starting after sunset, the team scrambled toinstall the steel braces, completing the taskjust fifteen minutes before a torrential stormbroke at midnight. Luna took the storm’s passion and stood her ground!

Arborists, foresters, horticulturists, andother experts have been consulted on the feasibility and advisability of wound grafting.However, before Luna could ever be grafted,she needed further stabilization to withstandrecord storms. Four heavy cables wereinstalled at mid-height (one hundred feet).Three were anchored with turnbuckles to thebase of nearby redwoods, and a fourth wasaffixed to a soil anchor set twenty-seven feetinto the earth.

PROGNOSIS

Luna will survive. Coast redwoods areremarkably resilient, one of the oldest andmost successful trees in the fossil record. Theyare always “overbuilt,” in that their vascularsystem can be destroyed to some extent, andthe remainder will sustain life. Water and dissolved minerals will continue to be drawnup from the earth, and the needled crown willcontinue to photosynthesize sugars to powerLuna’s metabolism.

We cannot know how much of Luna’s rootsystem has been irretrievably severed from a

Many League members have asked if saving one tree was worth the two

years that Julia Butterfly spent physicallyoccupying the old growth redwood thatis now known as Luna, a conservationstrategy very different from the League’sapproach. Julia’s courage and persistencebrought worldwide attention to the continued logging of the last 4% of theold growth redwoods and inspiredadmiration for the difference one personcan make. Since her return to theground, Julia has spent her time challenging audiences across the countryand internationally to address forestryissues in their own regions and countries,as well as describing the threats toCalifornia’s redwoods.

4 SAVE-THE-REDWOODS LEAGUE ♦ Spring Bul let in 2001

source of carbohydrates. Healthy rootgrafts from Luna and adjacent treesmay help to sustain disconnected roots.

A substantial part of Luna’s rootsystem will atrophy, and partialdieback can be expected in her crown.As humidity and rainfall decrease, and temperatures increase, the evaporationrate of water from the needles willalmost certainly exceed the capacity of the root structure to draw adequatemoisture. The tree will leave produc-tive boughs intact, and divert moisturefrom less efficient parts of the crown. Needleswill dry and fall from some green boughs,yielding twisted wooden crags that are devoidof needles, but not of character. Luna willenter a new phase of life.

— Denis Yniguez, President, American Societyfor Consulting Arborists, and RegisteredConsulting Arborist, Berkeley, CA, (510) 649-9291 treedec@aol.com. A full version of the text is available at:www.savetheredwoods.org/Spring2001.

With her recent gift for the purchase of DillonwoodGrove, League member Josephine DeWittRhodehamel sent this story:

We must save these old growth giants!

They should be the most honored and revered ofall living beings and we the most fortunate for theprivilege of sharing the planet with those that remain.

I remember a very special giant sequoia I sawabout forty years ago when my husband and I weredriving through Balch Park in southern SequoiaNational Park. This lone giant had been sawn completely through but had not fallen. It had refusedto bow to the wood cutter, but stood tall and defiant, though lifeless, for many years. It made methink of a doomed character in a Greek tragedy.

I have never forgotten its silent reproach of man’sdestruction of our great forests. My check is in memory of that brave tree. I wish it could be more.

— League member Josephine DeWitt Rhodehamel

SAVE-THE-REDWOODS LEAGUE ♦ Spring Bul let in 2001 5

Photo by Shaun

Walker/OtterMedia

Mapping theRedwoods

Maps play a central role in theLeague’s continuing mission

to protect the ancient redwood forest. In the early years, these werehand-drawn illustrations depictingongoing projects. The League’s Geographic Information System(GIS) program started in 1997 witha grant from the ConservationTechnology Support Program. Weare now using GIS techniques toensure our work continues to reflectpriorities supported by the bestavailable science, applied with thebest tools. The League’s use of GISin support of its Master Plan for theRedwoods was featured on thecover of a recent issue of GEOWorld— a leading spatial technologiespublication. The complete articlecan be read on the GEOPlace website at http://www.geoplace.com/gw/2001/0201/0201emg.asp.

What Is a Redwood?When most people write or say “redwood,”

they probably are referring to the coastredwood, whose scientific name is Sequoiasempervirens. This “original redwood” wasfirst observed by European explorers near thecentral California coast in 1769. It takes itsname from its reddish bark and the reddishhue of its heartwood. The coast redwood hasbeen the focus of most activities of Save-the-Redwoods League.

Giant sequoia, sometimes called “Sierraredwood,” was not known to the scientificworld until specimens and seeds were collectedfrom North Grove, Calaveras, in 1852. It issimilar to the coast redwood in its bark, cones,and wood; both live to ages exceeding 2,000years; and both are the tallest and have the

greatest diameterof any of thespecies that growwith them. Callingthe giant sequoia a redwood madesense both practically and scientifically.

After nearly acentury, however,the giant sequoiawas reclassifiedinto its own genus,Sequoiadendrongiganteum. Thisreclassification was based on some details of itsembryo develop-ment, but thesetwo “redwoods”differ in otherrespects as well.For example, coastredwood trees

have 66 large chromosomes and from 0 to 6smaller ones, while giant sequoias have a con-sistent 22 large chromosomes. The seeds ofthe coast redwood ripen in about 9 monthsfrom fertilization, and the cones all open andshed the seeds at that time. Giant sequoiaseeds take about 2 years to ripen, and thecones subsequently remain closed on the tree,often for decades, until opened by squirrels,cone insects, or the heat of a forest fire. Save-the-Redwoods League has been active in preserving and protecting several of the 70-plus native giant sequoia groves.

During World War II, a third “redwood”species was discovered, first as many fossils,which were named Metasequoia glyptostro-boides. Shortly thereafter, a very small population of trees found in a remote valley in China proved to be living Metasequoia.These trees became known popularly as “dawn redwoods” after evaluation by independentscientific expeditions led by Save-the-RedwoodsLeague and Harvard in the late 1940s. But isMetasequoia really a redwood? Its wood issimilar to redwood and it stands much tallerthan its neighboring species where it exists as old growth in China. However, theMetasequoia’s needles and cone-scales areopposite each other, rather than in the spiralarrangement of redwood and giant sequoialeaves and cones. And, perhaps because it oncelived above the Arctic Circle in sunless winters,it sheds all of its green foliage in the fall. TheLeague is sponsoring research to better under-stand the Metasequoia’s relationship to otherredwoods and recently sponsored a returnexpedition to the native population of dawnredwoods in China. Although now propagatedwidely, the very small native population and itsassociated ecosystem are certainly at great risk.

— League Councillor Dr. Bill Libby

Dillonwood Grove, February 2001

6 SAVE-THE-REDWOODS LEAGUE ♦ Spring Bul let in 2001

SAVE-THE-REDWOODS LEAGUE ♦ Spring Bul let in 2001 7

Dillonwood co-owner Dave Reed and a friend enjoyone of the many spectacular views at the Grove.

Many of our supporters have includedSave-the-Redwoods League in their estate plans.Bequests provide important future support thatenables the League to purchase and protect redwood land. We also have ways to create amemorial for a loved one. If you would like more

information about including the League in your will,a living trust, or our memorial grove program,please contact our office toll free at (888) 836-0005or visit: www.savetheredwoods.org. This is a greatway to protect our ancient forests, water andwildlife for the enjoyment of future generations.

The giant sequoia is the world’s most massive tree. Trees 290 feet tall with

trunks 36 feet base diameter have been found.Giant sequoia are also extremely long-lived.The oldest are believed to be from 2,200 to3,300 years old. Native giant sequoia growonly on the western slopes of California’sSierra Nevada Mountains, between 4,500 and8,400 feet, in 67 isolated groves. The largestgiant sequoia in the world, the GeneralSherman, is located in Sequoia National Park.There is enough wood in this one tree to build40 five-room houses. Amazingly, the lowerbranches of the General Sherman are largerthan any individual tree east of the MississippiRiver!

For such a tall tree, giant sequoia roots arevery shallow, often less than ten feet deep.They extend widely from the mighty trunkproviding stability against windstorms. Thecombination of high tannin and low resincontent in the thick, fibrous bark make thetrees highly resistant to forest fires. When firedoes breach the bark, it can create “goosepens” — hollows that provide habitat formany animals. Rarely are they detrimental tothe tree’s health.

Fire is essential to the regeneration of thegiant sequoia. The cones of the giant sequoiaare surprisingly small, obtaining a maximumlength of only 3.5 inches. They take morethan 2 years to mature and may remain on the

tree for decades. A single tree develops onaverage 1,500 cones per year and whenmature may contain up to 40,000 cones atany one time. Over the years, fire supressionhas curtailed regeneration of the giant sequoia.At the same time, fire suppression has encour-aged the growth of understory species. Fire isslowly being reintroduced into the giantsequoia groves, allowing a new generation ofgiant sequoia trees to become established.

Focus on the Giant Sequoia

Create a Redwood Legacy

Photo by

Ernie Braun

831918–2001

League Donates Redwood Forest

Save-the-Redwoods League114 Sansome Street, Room 1200

San Francisco, CA 94104

(415) 362-2352fax (415) 362-7017

redwoods@savetheredwoods.orgwww.savetheredwoods.org

League members and county officials gathered on March 30th to celebrate theLeague’s donation of 410 acres to the

County of Santa Cruz. A majestic stand of old growth redwoods borders Kings Creek as it flows through the property. The League purchased the property, located in BoulderCreek on Kings Creek Road, in 1994 for $2.4 million from the University of Californiato save it from being logged.

Santa Cruz County has opened the trails of its newest and largest county park for thepublic’s use. In the future, the park may be used as the site for outdoor education facilitiesfor students county-wide, and as a living laboratory for the local high school’s watershedacademy.

Speaker Pro Tem of the California StateAssembly Fred Keeley (D-Boulder Creek)praised the gift. “Save-the-Redwoods Leaguehas taken a bold step to further protect thisexcellent piece of property in perpetuity. I amvery excited to hear that the County will be the final recipient of the Miller property, and I congratulate the League for their leadershipalmost a decade ago to protect the propertyfrom timber operations,” Keeley said. As aCounty supervisor in 1994, Keeley had spear-headed the campaign urging the UniversityRegents to spare the property and sell it forconservation and public ownership.

Jeff Almquist (5th District Santa CruzCounty Supervisor) accepted the gift of theproperty, saying, “We are incredibly grateful for this generous donation to the County.” The League is pleased to announce the creation

of our Redwood Education Grants program.Educators in both the formal and non-formalsectors who work with K–12 students areencouraged to submit grant proposals by July 15.A total of $25,000 will be available in the2001–2002 academic year. Application guide-lines and granting criteria are available on theLeague’s website. If you are a teacher, or if youknow someone who works with children, pleasevisit our website at www. savetheredwoods.org.Follow the “Program Areas” link to the para-graph entitled “Education and Research.”Within this paragraph is a link called “EducationGrants.”

Seeking Grant Applications

League members enjoy the shade of an oldgrowth redwood at the new county park.

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