Author Topic: Giant Sequoia’s (Read 2147 times)

KGNC · « **on:** February 20, 2006, 03:06:36 pm »

Need some advise.
My 10 year old son was looking at my Bailey's catalog and saw that they had Giant Sequoia seedlings. He decided that's what we needed, even after I explained that his great grand kids would still not have the giant tree he wants.
Since I was ordering some sawchains and other stuff from them I spent 20 bucks for the 20 trees. Now I've got them and am looking for advise for planting and growing.
I was considering a southernly facing slope that has good drainage but some west side shade and doesn't receive a lot of the evening sun, but I have other locations. The elevation is about 3600'.
Did a web search and can't really find that anyone has had any sucess in the southern appalachians.
Does anyone have any experience with these trees? Any recommendation on perpaing the soil? Any help would be welcomed.

SwampDonkey · « **Reply #1 on:** February 20, 2006, 04:07:25 pm »

I'm no expert on them, but I don't think your climate is going to be suitable for their growth. Probably too dry, they come from the 450 mile long coastal 'Fog Belt' of the west coast. A seedling nursery was even selling them out of Quebec a few years back and I tried a couple. They died even before winter came.

Tillaway · « **Reply #2 on:** February 20, 2006, 04:39:24 pm »

Sequoia’s come from the Sierra Nevada and do well in a dry high elevation setting with deep winter snow pack. Try them on the dryer sites, they are planted off site in Northern California interior mountains and do well.

Coastal Redwood do better in the fog belt but grow about anywhere in western Oregon or Washington if you plant them... just not quite as big. The fog condenses on the needles in the crown and serves to water them through the growing season even if it doesn't rain along the coast.

SwampDonkey · « **Reply #3 on:** February 20, 2006, 05:56:59 pm »

ok, Sequoiadendron, my mistake

KGNC · « **Reply #4 on:** February 20, 2006, 06:25:51 pm »

Well, I do have some Rhododendron that are almost big enough to make lumber.

SwampDonkey · « **Reply #5 on:** February 20, 2006, 06:33:39 pm »

I'll see your Rhododendron and raise you a 6 inch dbh mountain maple.

KGNC · « **Reply #6 on:** February 20, 2006, 06:59:24 pm »

"Mountain Maple" is that the same as Striped Maple? If It is I got one of those. If not, I fold.

SwampDonkey · « **Reply #7 on:** February 20, 2006, 07:08:01 pm »

Nope not the same, but I actually ment 'Striped' I know where there is a whole hill top of striped maple, looks like a stand a bamboo.

But in the 'So how big you want'm' thread there is a big mountain maple. We usually only get them about 1 inch diameter because the moose terrorize it so bad.

I cut down a couple of 4 inch striped maple last spring when thinning, and my intensions were to leave them. But my mind was telling me I had to leave the balsam fir and red maple instead. Then the dang moose came in and scraped the bark off most them maples. I've got to do something about them things.

KGNC · « **Reply #8 on:** February 20, 2006, 07:42:45 pm »

I was looking it up, The Audubon field guide says that Striped Maple is allso called "moosewood" and Mountain Maple is also "Moose Maple"

SwampDonkey · « **Reply #9 on:** February 20, 2006, 07:54:30 pm »

Yes the dendro book calls striped maple moose wood. I grew up with calling it moose wood locally. They sure love the stuff, that's a fact.

asy · « **Reply #10 on:** February 21, 2006, 03:10:06 am »

I just bought some Redwood seeds too.

Got some Giant, and some Californian ones.

Gonna see how well they do here in the hot part of the world!

asy

iain · « **Reply #11 on:** February 21, 2006, 02:58:34 pm »

They grow all over the place here
dont kow if that help's

first time on Ask the Forester Board

iain

SwampDonkey · « **Reply #12 on:** February 21, 2006, 03:01:18 pm »

Iain, sounds like your describing a crop of weeds.

<<===== I await my prize

iain · « **Reply #13 on:** February 21, 2006, 04:17:20 pm »

What i am saying is that they grow in a variety situations

bleedin eeyore's they all the same where ever you find then

iain

SwampDonkey · « **Reply #14 on:** February 21, 2006, 04:55:02 pm »

I think my latitude on the globe is too harsh for some of those non natives.

iain · « **Reply #15 on:** February 21, 2006, 05:33:25 pm »

I think you get far to much latitude as it is

iain

crtreedude · « **Reply #16 on:** February 21, 2006, 05:48:42 pm »

I once had a person contact me wanting teak sees for their greenhouse. I had to let them down gentle by telling them that a teak seedling can grow up to 1/2" A DAY with the right conditions for the first few years.

That would be 15' in about a year, by the second year - 30 feet tall.

Not really suitable for greenhouses I am afraid - sounds like "Little Shop of Horrors" to me.

SwampDonkey · « **Reply #17 on:** February 21, 2006, 06:04:09 pm »

Well now, you must know by now that some people have to 'see for themselves'.

Dale Hatfield · « **Reply #18 on:** February 21, 2006, 09:10:41 pm »

If ya really want to please the little guy ,buy him a Dawn Redwood tree.
By the time he is out of college it ought to be a pretty good sized tree.
I'm not sure that its really a Redwood, I think its a Chinese import or some crap. But its wood is red in color light in weight, and bends like its made of rubber.
We cut one down for a home owner a few years ago . First one i ever cut. Hauled logs out and carved some milled some . You can put a 2x4 over ya shoulder and watch it bend. It had pretty big growth rings 1/2 some bigger some smaller. Now that i know em i see em all round.
I have seen them for sale in the nursery flyer's that get sent out this time of year. Claim its one of the oldest trees around. who knows.
Dale

SPIKER · « **Reply #19 on:** February 22, 2006, 05:07:41 pm »

I actually brought back a bunch of the sequoa cones and they were/are not that impressive pretty small for such a tree that grows from them (I got to spend a weekend up in the park in North CA back in 92 what a place and man what a bunch of trees ! I got a few good camera shots SOMEPLACE with my at the time GF posing in front of one of the sequas she looked like a barbie doll seting next to a 300 yr old oak!

the redwoods were just un-photographable to get into perspective. I took 4 or 5 shots from about 100+ feet away to get base to crown using my 35 mm camera, this tree I think was well 100's of feet high with a base in the 8+' dia. the redwood pine cones now3 those would kill ya if it hit ya from top ! one I saw comming out being carried by a guy was a GIANT thing looked to be 18+" long and maybe 6" dia. the sequas pine cone was maybe 1~1.5" long by 1" in dia almost egg shapped. I looked close to the visitor areas to try & find one of those redwood ones no luck. only a handfull of the sequas cones...

markM

Ron Wenrich · « **Reply #20 on:** February 22, 2006, 05:30:07 pm »

Dawn redwood is one of the oldest trees that is known. I believe its from prehistoric times.

As for the big pine cone, it sounds a whole log like sugar pine, not redwood. They can get up to about 2'. Redwoods are about 1".

I worked with a guy that was measuring a sugar pine. But, a squirrel was also working on one of those cones, while it was green. It fell a couple hundred feet and hit the guy on his head.

Good thing he had a ding hat on. It still drove him to his knees.

beenthere · « **Reply #21 on:** February 22, 2006, 06:11:15 pm »

spiker
Sounds like your 'redwood' cones are a good description of the sugar pine cones or maybe the jeffrey pine or digger pine.
Me thinks the redwood cones are about ½" in diam.

Here is a pic
redwood cone

and of a Digger pine cone

SwampDonkey · « **Reply #22 on:** February 22, 2006, 06:18:39 pm »

I was thinking sugar pine as well. I was reading the other day that for such a gigantic tree family, they (redwood and Sequoia) have such small cones and seeds.

Tillaway · « **Reply #23 on:** February 22, 2006, 09:27:51 pm »

Sugar Pine cones... Digger Pine grow on the really low site class lands. Sugar Pine grow up in the Sierra and all the way into the coastal Redwood zone. Coulter Pine grow on harsh sites down around So. Cal and have large cones that look kinda like Digger Pine but smaller. Jeffery are the same size and shape as Poderosa pine cones.

SPIKER · « **Reply #24 on:** February 23, 2006, 08:45:21 pm »

ahhh that verry well could be, I was aware of the sequa size and only figured that they BIG one was from the redwoods, but I stand corrected. was the sugar pines similar to the redwoods? I spent a lot of time looking at the woman I was with & the others running around (I was 25 or so then

) now I pay more attension to the surroundings that don't have 2 legs

but then my woman makes sure of that

I only got to see that BIG cone from about 30 or so yards, I assumed it was the redwoods, while I did get the sequas cones home I never tried to get any to grow as our ohio soil PH is bad for them ... I'll be goig back there someday before I hit 50 for sure

mark M

solodan · « **Reply #25 on:** February 23, 2006, 11:34:05 pm »

Quote from: SPIKER on February 22, 2006, 05:07:41 pm

those would kill ya if it hit ya from top ! one I saw comming out being carried by a guy was a GIANT thing looked to be 18+" long and maybe 6" dia.

If you were in one of the sequoia groves, than a cone this large could only be a sugar pine. lots of 18" cones, but rarely do I see ones longer than that. and yes, a green one could probably kill you if it hit you. A friend of mine lost his skylight a few times to sugar pine cones.

Without a doubt, if a green digger pine cone fell and hit you, if it didn't kill you on contact , you would probably bleed to death.

those things weigh a few pounds, and have very sharp spikes.

To the original question, I think they may do well in your area. At the given elevation, I would imagine you get plenty of below freezing days in the winter, and several warm days in the summer. The only thing you probably lack is the extremely heavy snow. Lots of Sequoias were planted here 30 to 40 years ago, and those trees are now 60 to 80 feet. Still a small tree, but a beautiful one.

Furby · « **Reply #26 on:** March 04, 2006, 03:37:55 am »

I have some sugar, redwood, and sequoia cones, with a some seeds as well.

Never did try planting any though. $:-\$

SwampDonkey · « **Reply #27 on:** March 04, 2006, 09:01:30 am »

Furb, depending on how long you had them and how they were stored they might be duds by now.

Frank_Pender · « **Reply #28 on:** March 06, 2006, 11:04:01 pm »

I have had folks plant the Sequoia in semi wet soils with good success. I have some butt logs in the yard that are 5'+ and only 28 years old. We removed 10 in West Salem a couple years ago and the fella that planted them told me the eage. the growth rings are up to an inch and a quarter apart, for some years. I took some to the Oregon logging conference again this year to make lumber for 650 bird feeders, for outdoor school kids this May.

SPIKER · « **Reply #29 on:** March 07, 2006, 08:11:30 pm »

hehehe I saw West Salem, and though huh I never knew there were sequas there (I have a home in West Salem OHIO)

dah

but groth rings 1" appart?! that is much faster than I had imigined. I was under impression they were slow growers

how about sending some pine cones / seed this way!?

mark M

Minnesota_boy · « **Reply #30 on:** March 07, 2006, 08:25:33 pm »

They are slow growers, especially when they are crowded and are getting big. Some of the redwoods I saw had lots of growth rings per inch, but the younger managed stands have very fast growth. Spaced properly and no overstory to compete with makes a huge difference.

SwampDonkey · « **Reply #31 on:** March 08, 2006, 05:57:10 am »

Light and space = pseudo-fertilizer

firedog · « **Reply #32 on:** March 09, 2006, 03:24:31 pm »

I just had 450 planted and I hope they grow nice and fast like what is talked about up above. Looking forward to seeing the progression between them my fir and the cedar that survive the deer and elk

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Author Topic: Giant Sequoia’s (Read 2147 times)