The second-tallest flowering plant in the world is found only in a few pockets in the soutwest corner of Australia, where I was fortunate enough to spend a week in January. The tree is the spectacular Karri, Eucalyptus diversicolor.
Even second-growth trees 100 years old ("regrowth" in Australian) are 200+ feet in height.
The cheapest way to build a fire lookout tower is to put the tower in the top of a tree. The one I climbed, the Goucester Tree, was topped at 200 feet to build the lookout building. The tree at the bottom is about 8 feet in diameter and it is still about 4 feet in diamter where it was topped. The heavy rebar rungs wind around the tree several times before reaching the lookout building, from which, of course, there is a terrific view. You can see from the photos that the tree has formed heavy callosities around the rungs. To my eye the tree seemed perfectly healthy with plenty of green foliage on the upper limbs. There are no lower limbs any more; the first limb was probably 100 feet high.
It was a bit unnerving climbing those open rungs without a harness or a rope. It is said that about 80% of the people who start up the ladder turn around without going to the top.
Even second-growth trees 100 years old ("regrowth" in Australian) are 200+ feet in height.
The cheapest way to build a fire lookout tower is to put the tower in the top of a tree. The one I climbed, the Goucester Tree, was topped at 200 feet to build the lookout building. The tree at the bottom is about 8 feet in diameter and it is still about 4 feet in diamter where it was topped. The heavy rebar rungs wind around the tree several times before reaching the lookout building, from which, of course, there is a terrific view. You can see from the photos that the tree has formed heavy callosities around the rungs. To my eye the tree seemed perfectly healthy with plenty of green foliage on the upper limbs. There are no lower limbs any more; the first limb was probably 100 feet high.
It was a bit unnerving climbing those open rungs without a harness or a rope. It is said that about 80% of the people who start up the ladder turn around without going to the top.