Steve Dongle's top 100 trees.- No 2 The Giant Redwood

The Giant Redwood (Sequoiadendron giganteum)

 photo taken from 'On the Trail of the Lonesome Pine' by O.Hardy and S. Laurel - Acorn Press 1910.
 (with kind permission of the Ted Trellis Foundation)

Oh gentle giant and brittle wood.  Friend of the longhorn beetle and Douglas Squirrel. Noble king of the forest with species exemplars named after Presidents: Lincoln, Grant and Sherman. How ashamed should we be that mankind once squandered your noble timber upon the manufacture of 'matches'.

"Every one of us in our daily lives affect our fragile ecosystems. Every choice you make, every cake you bake, every journey you take - I'll be watching you!" Steve Dongle; Eco-warrior, environmental activist and compiler of the Waveney Gazette's Top 100 Trees.
 

The Redwoods

Joseph B. Strauss

Here, sown by the Creator's hand.
In serried ranks, the Redwoods stand:
No other clime is honored so,
No other lands their glory know.

The greatest of Earth's living forms,
Tall conquerors that laugh at storms;
Their challenge still unanswered rings,
Through fifty centuries of kings.

The nations that with them were young,
Rich empires, with their forts far-flung,
Lie buried now-their splendor gone:
But these proud monarchs still live on.

So shall they live, when ends our days,
When our crude citadels decay;
For brief the years allotted man,
But infinite perennials' span.

This is their temple, vaulted high,
And here, we pause with reverent eye,
With silent tongue and awestruck soul;
For here we sense life's proper goal:

To be like these, straight, true and fine,
to make our world like theirs, a shrine;
Sink down, Oh, traveler, on your knees,
God stands before you in these trees.

Credits: Wikipedia and Humboldt County California's Redwood Coast