The Arco Giant, one of the largest known redwoods [Robert Van Pelt] (Van Pelt 2001).

Sequoia sempervirens

(D. Don) Endlicher 1847

Common Names

Coast redwood, redwood, California redwood (Little 1980), coastal sequoia, palo colorado.

Taxonomic notes

Syn: Taxodium sempervirens D. Don in Lambert 1824 (Watson 1993); Sequoia sempervirens (Lambert) Endlicher (Peattie 1950). It is the sole species in Sequoia Endlicher 1847. Described varieties include adpressa, glauca, nana pendula, pendula and prostrata (Silba 1986).

Description

Tree to 60-100(110) m tall and 300-460(900) cm dbh. Trunk much enlarged and buttressed at the base and often with rounded swellings or burls, slightly tapering. Crown crown conic and monopodial when young, narrowed conic in age, irregular and open. Bark red-brown, to ca. 35 cm thick, tough and fibrous, deeply furrowed into broad, scaly ridges; inner bark cinnamon-brown. Branches downward sweeping to slightly ascending. Twigs slender, dark green, forking in a plane, ending in a scaly bud. Leaves 1-30 mm, generally with stomates on both surfaces, the free portion to 30 mm, those on leaders, ascending branchlets, and fertile shoots divergent to strongly appressed, short-lanceolate to deltate, those on horizontally spreading to drooping branchlets mostly linear to linear-lanceolate, divergent and in 2 ranks, with 2 prominent, white abaxial stomatal bands. Pollen cones nearly globose to ovoid, 2-5 mm, borne singly on short terminal or axillary stalks. Female cones 12-35 mm long, elliptical, reddish-brown, with many flat, short-pointed scales; pendant at end of leafy twig; maturing in one season; with 2-5 seeds per scale, light brown, 2-winged. Seeds flattened, 3-6 mm, leathery. 2n= 66 (Little 1980, Watson 1993).

The genus Sequoia has been described as follows: "Trees giant, evergreen. Branchlets terete, with obvious annual growth constrictions. Leaves alternate, mostly in 2 ranks. Adult leaves linear or linear-lanceolate to deltate, generally flattened, divergent to strongly appressed; abaxial glands absent. Pollen cones with 6-12 sporophylls, each sporophyll with 2-6 pollen sacs. Seed cones maturing and opening in 1 season, oblong to globose; scales persistent, 15-30, valvate, ± peltate, thick and woody. Seeds 2-7 per scale, lenticular, narrowly 2-winged; cotyledons 2(-4). x = 11" (Watson 1993).

Range

USA: SW Oregon and NW California, confined to coastal areas (within 60 km of the sea) experiencing a great deal of fog; at elevations generally below 300 m, occasionally to 1000 m. Mostly found in alluvial soils, where it forms pure stands or occurs with Pseudotsuga menziesii, Chamaecyparis lawsoniana, or other local conifers (Little 1980, Watson 1993). See also Thompson et al. (1999).

Big Tree

The largest volume tree is the Del Norte Titan, discovered June 1998 in Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park, California, by Steve Sillett and Michael Taylor. This tree has an estimated stem volume of 1044.7 cubic meters and is 93.57 m tall with a dbh of 7.22 m (Van Pelt 2001).

The coast redwood is probably the tallest tree on earth, although one occasionally hears of extraordinarily tall eucalypts in Western Australia, and during historical times there have been Douglas-firs (Pseudotsuga menziesii) known to be taller than any coast redwoods now living. However, it is quite likely that the tallest coast redwoods were early victims of the axe, so it is difficult to say if the redwoods was the tallest of conifers during early historical time. The following table (source, Michael Taylor 1998 updated by Steve Sillett (email Nov-2004) and Bob Van Pelt (pers. comm., Oct-2006), provides summary information on all coast redwoods known to be over 110 meters tall, as measured by direct tape drop or Criterion 400 laser surveyor.

Name	Location	Height (m)	DBH (m)
Hyperion	Redwood National Park, CA	115.55	--
Helios	Redwood National Park, CA	114.34	--
Icarus	Redwood National Park, CA	113.11	3.6
Stratosphere Giant	Humboldt Redwoods State Park, CA	112.87	5.19
National Geographic Society Tree	Redwood National Park	112.74	4.30
Paradox Tree	Humboldt Redwoods State Park	112.59	3.78
Federation Giant	Humboldt Redwoods State Park	112.45	4.38
Mendocino Tree	Montgomery Woods State Preserve, CA	112.01	3.17
Harry Cole Tree	Redwood National Park	111.65	4.94
Swamp Tree	Montgomery Woods	110.77	3.02
Pipe Dream Tree	Humboldt Redwoods State Park	110.64	4.27
Redwood Creek Giant	Redwood National Park	110.4	5.21
Lost Hope Tree	Humboldt Redwoods State Park	110.4	5.03
Rockefeller Tree	Humboldt Redwoods State Park	110.34	4.14
Daedalus	Redwood National Park	110.34	--

Oldest

Several data point to a maximum age of somewhat more than 2000 years. A ring-counted age of 2200 years was reported for a specimen from N California collected by Fritz (Brown 1996). This was probably a stump count. I have a section cut from a log in Humboldt Redwoods State Park that has at least 2026 rings. HERE is a report on it, the only one available. This specimen has poor circuit uniformity with many missing rings, so it may be as old or older than Fritz' specimen. There is also said to be a cross-section on display at the visitor center in Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park, Santa Cruz, CA, that has 1935 rings with the center of the log missing; the original tree was felled in Humboldt County (Kenyon Moon email 2007.11.04).

http://www.sempervirens.org/sequoiasemp.htm :

Although Sequoia sempervirens have been cultivated elsewhere, this tree naturally achieves its majestic heights and lush groves only in one place in the world -- a 450-mile strip along the Pacific Coast of North America, beginning in southern Oregon and ending just south of Monterey, California.