PHOTO: DYarrow 9/21/01
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PHOTO: DYarrow 9/21/01 |
GOWANDA, New York—It's official. The Zoar Valley gorge, which separates Cattaraugus and Erie counties, contains some of the tallest trees in the Northeast. The tall, old-growth trees were documented Saturday in the wildest and most remote areas of Zoar Valley, which flanks Cattaraugus Creek between Springville and Gowanda. Some of the trees were 150 feet tall, and are between 300 and 350 years old.
Members of the Western New York Old Growth Forest Survey accompanied Robert Leverett of Holyoke, Mass., who heads the Eastern Native Tree Society to identify the trees. Mr. Leverett also visited old-growth sites in Lily Dale in Chautauqua County, Reinstein Woods in Cheektowaga and Hemlock Lake south of Rochester.
The "Gallery of Giants" is in a remote area east of Valentine Flats in the 3,000-acre Zoar Valley Multiple Use Area. It is protected by shale cliffs that rise between 300 and 400 feet above the creek bed. In Western New York, only the cliffs at Letchworth State Park are higher. The rich river soils, soaring cliffs and the remoteness have protected these trees from wind, lightning strikes and chain saws.
share excitement over a big tree in Zoar Valley  |
PHOTO: DYarrow 9/21/01 |
Bruce Kershner of Williamsville organized the Western New York visit of Mr. Leverett. An authority on ancient forests, Mr. Kershner heads the Old Growth Forest Survey, which is a project of the Niagara Frontier Botanical Society and the Buffalo Audubon Society. He is the author of "A Guide to the Ancient Forests of Zoar Valley Canyon."
Mr. Kershner organized the tall trees tour, in part, to help convince state officials to place the old-growth forest areas of Zoar Valley off limits. "This is the wildest, most remote place in Western New York," he added. "We want to raise awareness that this ancient forest is here so people can come here to appreciate the trees, not cut them down" as the Department of Environmental Conservation has proposed, he said. Gov. Pataki has shelved those plans for now, he added.
Mr. Kershner, Tom Diggins, now a biologist at Hamilton College in central New York, Jerry Horwitz of the Town of Niagara and others have been trying to get Mr. Leverett to Zoar Valley for years to document the ancient forest. A group of about 20 interested people accompanied Mr. Leverett on the Zoar Valley big tree tour, including Carol Woodin and Jeff McMullen of Cuba, who fought plans to harvest timber at the Pfeiffer Nature Preserve near Portville.
illustrates a big tree circumference  |
PHOTO: DYarrow 9/20/01 |
David Yarrow of East Greenbush, director of the New York Champion Tree Project, was also on Saturday's tour. He also was amazed at the height of the trees in the Gallery of Giants—or Gallery of Champions as Mr. Kershner began referring to the area after the tour. Mr. Yarrow maintains a website of champion trees at www.championtrees.org.
"Holy Toledo, these trees are awesome," Mr. Leverett said as he used a laser measuring device to determine the height of the various tree species. Many of the trees were the tallest of their species north of the Great Smoky Mountains. "This was remarkable," he said after Saturday's six-hour tour of Zoar Valley.
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PHOTO: DYarrow 9/21/01 |
Mr. Leverett is a teacher at Holyoke College and a hospital administrator. He has been touring the eastern U.S. since 1985 documenting old-growth tree stands. Among the "champion" trees he measured were a 130.8-foot red oak, a 133-foot cottonwood, which is the tallest north of the Great Smoky Mountains, and a 150.3-foot sycamore tree that is the second-tallest in the east. Only a sycamore in the Great Smoky Mountains is taller by 18 inches.
"It was a tremendous pleasure and an honor to see this forest survive into the 21st century," said Mr. Leverett. "The idea that old growth isn't important begs the question what is important," he said. "This is our real tie to the past. I look at these places as botanical ties to the past.
"These are the places that make us think about what the land was like in the 1600s. Our connection to the past is this forest cathedral," he explained. "A state agency that is so tied to the timber industry and the commodity are doing the people a great disservice" by proposing to cut old-growth forests like this. "We have science on our side," he declared.
Mr. Leverett said the oldest trees in the Zoar Valley forest appear to be in the 300- to 350-year range, with many more in the 150- to 200-year range. "My purpose is to identify exemplary places and put them in a comparison contest—from really nice to rare," said Mr. Leverett. "We're trying to understand what is here and how it compares to other stands."
Other tall trees documented on the tour included a 150-foot tulip tree, sugar maples in the 250- to 300-year-old range, a 132.9-foot white ash with a circumference of 8 feet, 200-year-old red pines and a 116-foot black walnut tree.
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"We saw some remarkable trees. The fact there were other very tall trees indicates they weren't freaks—circus trees. It was the growing conditions," said Mr. Leverett.
© The Times Herald, Olean, N.Y. 2001
