Arbor Month, No Foolin’

Arbor Day is April 20, except in Portland I’ve recently learned, we are observing Arbor Month. “Why limit a tree celebration to one day when it could last a whole month?” Good question.  It’s been a long time since I’ve done anything in observance of Arbor Day — my thinking is along the same lines as above. Why only one day for trees?  Each and every day can be about trees for some of us.  But I’m all for promoting trees in our community, so I’m looking forward to April this year.

The focus for Arbor Month is to highlight Heritage Trees.  Participants are invited to take a photo of themselves at one of Portland’s 300 Heritage trees and post it to the Portland Parks & Recreation Tree Stewards Facebook page.  (I see some enthusiastic folks already posted their shots in March.) Select your tree using this handy map.

   

I’ve chosen an awe-inspiring Heritage Tree that never fails to get my attention located at the NW corner of NE Weidler and NE 15th Avenue, a tulip tree, Liriodendron tulipifera. The Google map tag tells us these particulars on the tree:

• Tree # 3
• Height 72 ft
• Spread 65 ft
• Circumference 15.5 ft

Not surprising to find this tree mentioned and pictured in Trees of Greater Portland。 From the book, I learned this is the largest specimen in the metropolitan area, planted in the 1890s by George Nicolai.  Tulip trees are in the Magnolia family, native to the eastern U.S., and can reach 200 feet.  I’ve heard that organ builders make organ pipes from the wood of this tree.

This tree is truly deserving of it’s status as a Heritage tree, which are defined as trees “because of their age, size, type, historical association or horticultural value, are of special importance to the City.” It is a defining feature of this road intersection. Liriodendron have a beautiful strongly upright and pyramidal habit, but trees of this age exhibit a more open form.  This is the only specimen I’ve ever encountered with weeping branches.

Here’s the winter silhouette from standing underneath. Cables anchored to the ground support this mammoth tree.

   

Urban trees such as this merit special appreciation in parks and other public areas as they would be out of scale for most residential settings.  Maybe I’ll visit a few more Heritage Trees this month.  Studying the map, I see at least one more, also a Liriodendron, walking distance from my home…

If you want to plant a tulip tree in your yard, I hope you have a lot of space.  Here’s what I found on plantlust.com:

• 50 to 90 feet tall 25 to 40 feet wide
• USDA Zones 4a to 10b
• Plant in sun to part shade
• Yellow-green flowers in June
• Yellow fall foliage

For more info and photos, see Oregon State University’s Plant List.

Sakura

I think one of the (many) reasons I love trees is that I’m really not into flowers and blooms all that much.  I love green, and I love foliage.  But at this time of year, even I can appreciate this view.

Yes, it’s cherry blossom time.  I have no idea if this means more to me because of growing up in Japan, or if many people find that this sight breathtakingly beautiful.  In Japan a lot of significance is attached to cherry blossoms — more than I know on the subject can be found here.    “Hanami” (literally “flower viewing”) is an important tradition in Japan, celebrated with picnics under cherry blossoms in full bloom.  I haven’t attended the event before, but this year is the Third Annual “Sakura Sunday” cherry blossom festival in Portland:  April 7, 2013 at the Japanese American Historical Plaza from noon to 3PM.

I have been wanting to get down to the waterfront to photograph the blossoms at the Plaza, but this is spring break week, and family life is particularly busy.  I fear the blossoms will have dropped before I can make it to that location, so these shots (taken today on the way from soccer day camp to baseball practice) from a less glamorous spot at the corner of N. Williams and NE Sumner will have to do.

     

Earlier today, I was disappointed that I might miss the waterfront cherry blossoms this year.  Maybe I’ll still get there, but I realize now that I feel very content to have taken the time to appreciate viewing the ones I did encounter today.  I wonder how many other lesser known cherry blossom viewing places we have around Portland?

Planting trees…all together now!

It’s kind of addictive…got the whole family out today, including the kids’ cousin Holly visiting from Washington to help Friends of Trees plant 200 trees in the NE Portland neighborhoods of Concordia and Vernon.

The group was addressed by Congressman Earl Blumenhauer.

Here we are, pounding stakes, sticking labels, and watering trees:

And don’t forget a very important part of the day’s events: FOOD!

I can’t say that I turned my sons into converts today, but I know they will see the trees they planted around the corner and down a few blocks and remember being part of the effort.  I trust that over time, they will draw meaning from the experience.

Zoom

My 5th grader attends Opal School, a K-grade 5 Portland Public Schools charter school at the Portland Children’s Museum.  The school takes full advantage of its setting in Washington Park to access and experience the outdoors, giving the students time to breathe fresh air, feel the falling rain, get muddy, climb trees, hike, and run up and down grassy slopes.

Photo credit: Kimie Fukuda
All rights reserved

Photo credit: Kimie Fukuda
All rights reserved

They study and play in the areas immediately outside the school, but also within Hoyt Arboretum.  These years are a priceless gift that nurtures the students’ connection with the natural world in an age of “nature-deficit syndrome.”  I could go on and on about the incredible work that goes on at this school, but read their blog if you want to know more. The subject of this post is a special tree.

I don’t know the story of how this tree acquired the name “Zoom.”  It had been named before my children were enrolled.  Zoom is a large, multi-trunk western red-cedar, Thuja plicata, located outside the Children’s Museum. It is perfect for climbing.  My son fully explored the spreading lower limbs from the age of 3 onward.  Older children climb to the very top.

Climbing trees aren’t hard to find, but this tree offers more than that.  The lowest hanging foliage makes a curtain and ducking underneath one enters a new place — the shade is cooling, sounds are filtered out, outside views are screened — you’re not standing at the base of Zoom, you are within Zoom.

There is space here for an entire classroom of children to all explore and experience together.  There is something so unique about this — I think of most school yards with the hot sun baking down on flat asphalt surfaces and play equipment which suggests limited options, providing for few to use at a given time.  Zoom invites all to experience at each one’s level of comfort or inspiration — playing under, around, up a little, or way up high.  Alone, with a buddy, with your entire class.  What does it feel like to be uncertain and worried about finding one’s way down?  To have one’s feet touch the ground again, having climbed just a little bit higher than the day before?

Photo credit: Kimie Fukuda
All rights reserved

Photo credit: Kimie Fukuda
All rights reserved

How fitting that Zoom exists in such proximity to a school which values multisensory and experiential learning.  I have to believe that children with teachers who know the value of touching, climbing, loving a tree as a friend will grow into adults who know that living in relationship to trees is essential to our well-being.

Magnolia mystery: solved

I happened to be making a trip to Cistus Nursery today to purchase a loquat, Eriobotrya japonica, whose photo I fell in love with instantly last week when my mom blogged about the one in her garden in Japan.  It’s always a pleasure to be introduced to new and unusual plants while browsing at Cistus, but my happiest moment today was when I lucked into finding an answer to my question about the magnolia street trees I featured last week for the March Bloom Day.

 

Even though the specimens were tiny I recognized the beautiful blue-toned leaves with their smooth texture, but lacking the waxy sheen of M. grandiflora, and the tags identified the plant for me:  Magnolia maudiae.  I successfully resisted a very strong urge to purchase one.  One of the “most floriferous?”  “Fast growing,” yet narrow habit of “8 to 10 feet” wide?  Perfect for the urban garden — I’ll take it, but I have to wait until I can find a larger one that would survive possible attack by basketball or soccer ball in my yard. Which reminds me, I better go find a tomato cage to protect my new loquat.