Posted by
Cakeholemoon (Garfield, WA - Zone 6a) on Feb 20, 2018 10:14 PM concerning plant:
I love pine trees, and I especially love the Ponderosa Pine. There is a lone Ponderosa Pine tree living next to my property. It must be over 100 years old and 100 feet tall. I visit it once in a while and listen to the wind whispering through the needles way up in the branches at the top. The lower branches have long since receded. The puzzle-like bark is over 3 inches thick at the base with deep grooves. Fire protection at its finest. It had several sister trees living nearby that have fallen because the land that they lived on changed from dry land to wet land. During a wet and flooded winter, the wind blew them down exposing giant pancake-like root disks which could no longer hold the massive weight of the trees upright to the wet soggy earth. The lone survivor may be in danger. I planted a small stand of Ponderosas nearby on a dry hill above the flood plain. They were just seedlings when planted and now they are soaring above my head and catching some wind of their own. They grow fast, and now they are getting big enough for me to prune a few of the lower branches to allow easier passage for me into my miniature pine forest. I love the smell of my pine forest. I love to stand among them and take in the sights, smells, and sounds of them. I collected some pine needles from them one day and extracted the essential oil through a distillation process. A half-pound of pine needles yielded about 2 ml of oil. Now I can smell my favorite pine trees anytime, anyplace. And when I do, I am standing among them once again.
