The Portland Heritage Tree Quest: Group 5

February 17, 2020

Twenty Questions, continued

Question #2: Is the tour bigger than a breadbox? Yes, unless you know of a 500 mile by 200 mile by 2 mile breadbox somewhere that it could fit into.

Question #3: Does it include retrieving a bicycle helmet rashly and immaturely thrown into the desert? No, and stop trying to make me feel guilty. We’re not going back to Benson again this year!

The Portland Heritage Tree Quest

Happy Presidents Day! A day to remember with respect and gratitude the great leaders of our past. I’m going to observe the day by honoring a different set of revered ancients though: Portland’s heritage trees. If you were keeping us company last summer you may recall that I initiated a challenge to myself while we were impatiently waiting in Portland for Iberia to roll around on the calendar: The Portland Heritage Tree Quest. The goal is to make my way to an instance of each of the city’s distinct 120 distinct species or cultivars designated as a heritage tree through a series of day rides. Along the way I’ll get a modest bit of exercise, discover some new corners of the city, and hopefully learn something new about the tree world.

It’s a slow, painstaking process, and more challenging than I anticipated. Hard to come up with a sensible itinerary, and a challenge to locate some of the trees even with the address in hand. After four excursions I’ve only checked off 35 trees, plus one more that dropped from the inventory because the tree no longer exists- barely 30% of the list. We’ll be at this awhile, folks.

Before starting up again though, let’s pause to pay respect to yet a third set of revered elders: my parents. The clan gathered in Seattle this past weekend to celebrate my father’s birthday. You’ll recall that I’m 73, and my sister Elizabeth is three years older than I am; so if you’re any good at math and human biology you can appreciate how lucky we are to still have them both with us.

It was a grand celebration, and the most complete family gathering we’ve seen in years - every member of the family was there except our son Shawn and his two daughters. The most touching moment of the evening came at the end, when dad rose to propose a toast to mom, and to the fact that the two of them will celebrate their seventieth wedding anniversary this summer.

The Anderson family, at the most complete gathering we’ve seen in years.

Dad, my brother Stewart, and his daughter Lauren.

Lauren and her partner Peter, up from Oakland; and her brother Russell and his partner Victoria, up from San Antonio.

So, let the quest resume! Winter isn’t the best time for observing the deciduous trees, so the next pair of outings will try to bring in the remaining 20 evergreens we haven’t seen yet. They break down neatly into two equal groups: 10 on the east side of the river, and 10 on the west. Today, we’re eastward bound.

First though, we (Rodriguez and I; Rachael would never have patience for this, and is off collecting her 42 mile ride stamp for the day) bike west a few blocks to honor one of my favorite presidents, Teddy Roosevelt. He’d be a favorite even if I hadn’t gone to Roosevelt High School in Seattle half a century ago, but that helps. Go, Roughriders!

Image not found :( — Happy Presidents Day, President Roosevelt! And thank you for establishing the National Forest Service, five national parks, 18 national monuments and the nation’s first wildlife refuges!

OK. Let’s go find some trees. They’re all on the east side, so we begin by crossing the Willamette on the Hawthorne Bridge, possibly my favorite of the city’s extraordinary bridge collection.

Not much need for more narrative. The ride is the usual for this event: bike a ways, stop and recheck the map; come to the right street, look for an impressive tree; look for the label, realize we’re staring at a different impressive tree worthy of attention too, but not THE tree. Take some snapshots. Repeat. Along the way, allow myself to be diverted from time to time by something that catches my eye.

It’s a slow process - I’m out for three hours, add eight new trees to the list, and cover an unimpressive 21 miles. There’s still some time left in the day and a few more trees I’ve mapped a route to by the time I’m done; but it’s a chilly day, I’m hungry, I have to find a loo soon, and I forgot to bring the key to my lock so I can’t really stop and leave Rodriguez unprotected. So, I just head home and save the rest for another day.

This doesn’t relate to anything; I just like affectionate orange Toms (as opposed to soulless orange Dons, which I don’t care for so much). It reminds me of our old cat Cesar from thirty years ago, the toughest cat I’ve ever known.

No, Fortunately this isn’t the remains of a heritage tree. It’s another Cycle365 Challenge posting - a stump for Suzanne. She didn’t specify that it had to still be rooted, so hopefully this will meet her exacting standards.

And a philosopher, apparently. He went right for the Rousseau at this LFL.

And one more! Clinton Street is a real LFL hotbed. These three all exist in the space of three blocks.

One thing I really enjoy about this quest is that it takes me down Portland streets I’ve never visited before. This is Franklin High School, near Mount Tabor. Opened in 1917, it is the city’s fourth oldest high school.

This Monterey Pine, a native of the central California coast, is planted as a plantation tree. It is the most broadly introduced tree species in Australia, New Zealand and Spain.

Needles of the Monterey pine come in clusters of three, and are 3-6 inches long.

Needles of the Coulter pine (named for Thomas Coulter, botanist) come in bundles of three and are 6-12 inches long. The most striking feature of the tree though is the cone: sharp and spiky, they are huge - the largest of any pine tree - and can weigh an amazing 2-5 kg. That’s almost like a coconut! Nicknamed the widow maker, so it’s a good thing I had my helmet on. I didn’t know this at the time, so I’ll have to swing by again and look for a fallen cone to take a photo of.

Keeping Score:

Group 1 (7 species): grand fir, willow oak, hedge maple, Douglas fir, incense cedar, tulip tree, sugar maple.

Group 2 (9 species): silver maple, Japanese cedar, oriental plane tree, European beech, American chestnut, copper beech, mockernut hickory, basswood, butternut.

Group 3 (9 species): ginkgo, crape maple, northern red oak, deodar cedar, bigleaf linden, giant sequoia, coast redwood, Japanese pagoda tree, Mount Fuji flowering cherry.

Group 4 (8 species): Zelkova, Carolina poplar, Japanese red pine, Katsura, bur oak, river birch, catalpa, wych elm.

Group 5 (8 species): Monkey puzzle tree, western white pine, boulevard cypress, madrone, single needle pinyon, pecan, Coulter pine, Monterey pine.

Dropped (1 species): paradox maple, which I couldn’t find and may no longer exist.

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Steve Miller/GrampiesI assume that the tour is a relatively stable design, with the 2 mile bit being the height. Else, of course, you would need help from Elon Musk. But a 500 x 200 mile boundary is quite constrained, unless it goes up and down those 2 miles a lot. Hmmm.
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4 years ago

Scott AndersonTo Steve Miller/GrampiesAssumption is correct. roughly 2 mile vertical difference between the low and high points; 500 miles one direction (as the crow flies; or, more accurately the raven in this case, another subtle clue) and 200 the other.
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4 years ago

Jen RahnLove the photos of your family .. your parents look great!
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4 years ago

Steve Miller/GrampiesTo Scott AndersonRavens are a Native Westcoast thing and if we assume the 200 mile leg includes a ferry or ferries and does not count the ferry distances in the total? Something Pacific Northwest? Haida Gwaii the long way? Dodie
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4 years ago

Scott AndersonTo Steve Miller/GrampiesSneaky, trying to introduce a new question. We’ll consider answering it at a future time, but the books are closed for now. However, I refer you to the common raven range map (https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Common_Raven/maps-range) for some other possibilities. And no, before you ask, we are not going to Baffin Island.
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4 years ago

Gregory GarceauTwo mile vertical difference tells me you'll probably be in some pretty high mountains. (Pretty smart aren't I.) The fact that you'll be leaving in just a couple of months pretty much eliminates the Canadian Rockies. Probably not the Himilayans either. You won't get up from Badwater Basin to Telescope peak on your bikes. Not Alaska.

AHA! You're going to the Andes. Either that, or your going to climb Mt. Kilamanjaro or Mt. Fuji on your bikes.
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4 years ago

Scott AndersonTo Gregory GarceauVery clever! Hard to argue with your logic. I wish I could say more about your conclusions at this time, but I can’t. Perhaps you’re right, perhaps not. Note though that I said ‘roughly’ 2 miles. It has to be less than that of course, or it wouldn’t fit inside the specified box.
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4 years ago

Jacquie GaudetI'm going to vote for Baja California as the secret location.

Wherever it ends up being, though, I'll be following with interest!
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4 years ago

Scott AndersonTo Jacquie GaudetBaja! That’s an exciting idea. Among other things, I could see the single-needle pinyon pine on its home turf. And they have ravens there, so that fits our known facts too. And the climate is about right - much better at this time of year than Haida Gwaii (or Queen Charlotte Island, for those that haven’t kept up with the times). It’s only about 150 miles wide at its widest point, and only 3,000’ feet high, so that fits also.

Hmm - when I check the map though, I see that Baja is nearly a thousand miles long, even in raven miles. We’d have to fold it in half to fit it into our enormous bread basket. Probably don’t want to create an international incident, so maybe not this time.
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4 years ago

Bruce LellmanAs I remember, there was a prize for guessing it right. A free trip for two to.... where was that again?
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4 years ago

Scott AndersonTo Bruce LellmanBaffin Island. We want you to bike there and check it out so we don’t have to.
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4 years ago