Research Report #27— Dendrochronology-Sassafras
For many years scientists and naturalists have been studying and observing the flora and fauna of the Shawangunk Ridge. Foremost among them was Daniel Smiley, for whom Mohonk Preserve’s Daniel Smiley Research Center is named. Dan wrote numerous reports summarizing his observations on various topics. This regularly occurring series will feature some of these reports; some hold tremendous scientific value today and just await an interested researcher to follow up, others showcase a quirky sense of humor or highlight an oddity of nature.
Read the report: Dendrochronology-Sassafras. June-July 1975. Daniel Smiley.
A Note from Paul C. Huth, Director of Research Emeritus:
In June 1954, Ulster County Botanist Henry F. Dunbar, visited Benton Bar Cemetery, established in 1797 near High Falls, and collected a specimen of a large Sassafras tree growing there. Recognizing its exceptional size, in October 1959, he went back and measured it as follows: circumference 105 inches (or 33.4 inches diameter), height 45 feet, and spread (of the limbs) some 60 feet!
In 1972, Kenneth Davenport, Treasurer of the Benton Bar Cemetery Association, reported the tree to the state for consideration in it’s large tree register. Dan reported that the DEC responded to Ken that the tree “was the largest Sassafras then known in New York State. A picture of the tree was published in the Kingston Freeman on 3 January 1973.”
Of course, one would like to know the age of a tree of that size. On 27 June 1975, with Ken and neighbor Tang Hansen, Dan measured the tree, 21 years after Henry Dunbar measured it. It’s diameter had increased to 35.6 inches, it’s height (measured with an Abney Level) was 48 feet, and its spread was 67 feet. The bark was 1 1/2 inches thick. Dan used a 16 inch long increment borer and cored the tree on two sides, and recovered two 12 inch unfortunately disjointed cores, the increments separated due to several deep internal streaks of rot (see core photograph). Dan identified the outer most area of rot as healing over about 1903. To try and recover the detail from the annual increments lost to rot, Dan made a return visit on 2 July and found another large, 20.5 inch diameter, Sassafras nearby and cored it. It had solid wood to the center of the tree, and the resulting core Dan prepared and aged at 109 years. Allowing for 6 years for the sprout to reach core height, Dan estimated its age to be 115 years, or that it began its growth in 1860.
In an attempt to compare the age of the two nearby cored trees by trying to fill in the annual increments lost to the streaks of rot of the larger tree was made difficult in that the most recent 70 years of growth was quite uniform, thus lacking any distinguishing incremental anomalies to lineup and compare. Assuming that the early growth of both trees was similar to their quite uniform later growth, Dan extrapolated that the larger tree was some 135 years old. He carefully noted though, “this is only a guess, not an estimate.”
Sassafras (Sassafras albidum) is an interesting native tree to this area, just about reaching its northern range limit in the US. It is a member of the mostly warm and tropical plant family Lauraceae. Sassafras, like many members of the family, is very aromatic, and has been well known and widely used by people for centuries in a diversity of special and unique applications. One of the species true distinctions is its ability to sprout prolifically from its roots, forming large “genetically identical” clones or stands. Roots of Sassafras have been reported to spread outward at a rate approaching a meter a year. Sprouts from the roots can also grow upward at about the same rate, at times forming quite dense shrubby thickets. But, as Dan noted above, the species in the right situations can sometimes reach large tree stature. Sassafras in the Shawangunks is generally found as a well known colonizer of old fields, pastures, and disturbed poor soil sites. In early spring, twigs and young leaves are commonly browsed by Deer, Rabbits, and even Black Bear newly emerged from their dens. Dark blue/black fruits on upright red stems are an important fall food source for many species of birds, and in years with a good crop of fruit on the ridge have been found to be especially sought after by Black Bear.
In addition to the smaller second tree cored, Dan noted the existence of two additional Sassafras trees, all three “in a straight line which coincided with a line of gravestones,” and that “root sprouts [were] very abundant throughout the old part of the cemetery.” Dan also reported observing “a group of foot-tall sprouts….seen some 85 feet south of the nearest Sassafras tree.” Dan surmised that abundant Sassafras sprouts in the grass were cut off by annual lawn mowings, and those alongside headstones were removed when they finally reached above the height of the grave stones. This would indicate “major roots running down the lines of gravestones”, and that all eight trees and abundant spouts in the grass were in fact one large Sassafras clone! All parts of the large clone were “contributing to the large size and advanced age of their respective parent trees by supplying food to the various root systems.” Thinking at the species level and on the ecosystem scale, Dan felt that this Sassafras complex at Benton Bar “probably….could not happen in an area where man had not inadvertently created an environment favorable to attaining age for a tree with the adaptions of Sassafras.”
Dan ended his report with a few important “Historical Notes.” He notes that although Benton Bar was the accepted name for the original burying ground, “it was incorporated as the Kyserike Rural Cemetery in 1865,” although I hear many locals still refer to it today as Benton Bar. Of interest to the surveyor in Dan, “the south side of the cemetery is the Marbletown-Rochester town line,[continuing] across lands belonging to Tang Hansen to the Rondout Creek.” And, of particular importance to history, Dan records that “at the creek bank on the south side of [the base] of a [large] red oak tree is a brown stone monument with an “M” carved on the north side and an “R” in the south side,” locating this important town corner. I have two photographs in the files of the Daniel Smiley Research Center that Dan took of the monument in 1959 and 1975.
This May, we went back to Benton Bar Cemetery with John and Alice Cross to check out the large Sassafras tree and measure it again. John is a Trustee Emeritus of the Benton Bar Cemetery Association. In the 43 years since Dan measured the tree, it has increased its diameter by 8.1 inches to 43.7 inches! While in full bloom, unfortunately, the tree has incurred some major limb and bark damage at some time on it’s trunk that will likely negatively influence its future.
Read the report: Dendrochronology-Sassafras. June-July 1975. Daniel Smiley.
