A Forest Giant and a Lesson Learned

By Duane Ashby

When I was young, our family took a vacation trip to the Sequoia forests north of San Francisco.  After a drive up the coast, we crossed over the Golden gate bridge and continued northward until we reached the national forest.  There we camped for a few days amidst those giant sentinels of time.  I enjoyed the experience as a boy but it wasn’t until much later that I learned just how special and unique those trees are.

The giant Sequoia trees are the largest living things on this planet.  Reaching 280 to 310 in height, (20 to 25 stories), they can weigh as much as 12 million pounds.  “General Sherman” is the largest tree in the world and contains over 52,500 cubic feet of wood. These forest giants could actually grow taller than this, but lightning strikes tend to “top” them.

As guardians of the ancient forest, besides being the largest living things on this earth, they are also some of the oldest.  Trees in old-growth forests range in age from over 2300 years to nearly 3300 years making them the oldest living things on earth.  They started growing right about the time Solomon’s Temple was being completed in Jerusalem.  The oldest was “born” roughly 300 years before David faced Goliath with a sling and a stone.

All that said, there is something else that makes these trees truly remarkable; their root system.  They do not have a tap root, i.e. a central root that goes straight down into the ground to keep the tree stable and allow it to stand against winds.  Trees that tall, without a deep tap root would normally be easily pushed over by even a moderate wind.  Because of this, Sequoia trees could never survive if they were to try to grow all by themselves.

These trees develop a shallow network of roots that spread out just under the surface of the ground. The deepest of these roots reach only about 12 to 14 feet into the earth.  Also, the roots are not thick.  The main roots are not much thicker than 12-18 inches.  The bulk of the root mass is small thread-like roots that stay within 4 to 5 feet of the surface.  So how can trees as tall as these withstand winds with such a shallow, delicate root system?