The world champion Douglas-fir in height is found in Coos County, Oregon. But what if your interest lies in smaller trees? For example, the tallest vine maple (Acer circinatum) in the country is 46’ high and found in Clatsop County, Oregon. This detail, along with many, many others can be found in “Oregon: Big Tree & Shrub Measurements” by Jack Black.
At first glance, this book may seem like a curiosity, one person’s obsession with finding, measuring, and photographing (typically with a convenient human standing nearby for scale) the largest and tallest of the Oregon flora. However, the charts and especially the photographs gave me strong admiration of the diversity of woody plants in both wild and managed settings.
The roughly 200 species considered are almost evenly divided between natives and introduced species. Short vignettes give the back story for some of the more remarkable examples. Although Black compiled and published this book, his endnotes document the work of many individuals and organizations in finding, measuring, and recording these special trees. It represents a real labor of love by all involved. A new, larger edition was published in 2021.
Excerpted from the Spring 2021 issue of the Arboretum Bulletin