11-20-06

Paul Galloway’s Search for Giant Trees

By Charles C. Bingaman, Contributing Writer

          Some people collect stamps or teacups.  Paul Galloway of Walpole collects trees.  Big trees!

          Early in the 1950s, Galloway and his brother Pen (now deceased) heard about the New Hampshire Big Trees project to identify the largest living specimen of all types of trees growing in the Granite State.  And they were hooked!

          Galloway, 77, has spent his whole life in Walpole. “Trees are in my genes.  They really are!” he admits.  “Most of my ancestors were farmers and lumbermen.  And my most famous ancestor, Richard T. Fisher, founded the Harvard Forest educational and research center in 1907 that’s still going strong down in Petersham, Massachusetts along with a wonderful little museum named for him and 3,000 acres of forest that it manages.”

          “Pen and I got wind of the Big Trees program about the time it started.  He was all over New Hampshire, but I pretty much stuck to Walpole.  We had a LOT of fun finding big trees and species that were new to us! And I’ve always wanted to get other people interested.”

          Walpole is located in a transitional forest, according to Galloway, in that it contains a large variety of deciduous trees—trees that shed their leaves in the fall—and a large variety of evergreens.  “All my life I’ve roamed these hills in Walpole,” he notes, “and my eyes are just focused on trees.  So I have a pretty good idea of what’s out there.”

          And, charting “what’s out there” in terms of the county’s, the state’s and even the nation’s largest beech, white oak, red maple and dozens of other species has fueled Galloway’s competitive passion. 

          Created by the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests and now administered by the University of New Hampshire Cooperative Extension Service, the New Hampshire Big Trees program is similar to comparable programs in most states.  See http://extension.unh.edu/forestry/BigTree.htm for the current listing of New Hampshire’s largest trees in each category.  Anyone is eligible to file the official form nominating a specific tree and reporting the number of points it deserves based on its breast level trunk circumference, its height, and its ACS or average crown spread measured in feet and quartered.  One can even check the NATION’s largest known tree specimens at http://www.americanforests.org/resources/bigtrees/.

In Galloway’s case, his championship nominations are not based on casual size estimates!  Trunk girth is measured by tape measure.  Crown spread—the widest spread of the leaves—is measured by pacing off and measuring width of the widest and narrowest parts of the crown, averaging them, and dividing by four.  He measures height, the most difficult to check accurately, with a “clinometer”, a precision Finnish instrument made by the Suunto Company.  “I can get a really accurate height measurement.  83 feet, not 84!  Of course, if the tree is on a hillside or closely surrounded by other trees, as many in Walpole are, I need to take several measurements to be sure I have it exactly right!”  The number of points a tree rates is the total of the three measurements.

        Galloway and his big tree hunting friends keep a running roster of largest specimens among 27 tree species in Walpole from black cherry to black ash, from eastern hemlock to northern red oak.  Eighteen are Cheshire County champs—meaning the largest known example of their kind in the county—eight are New Hampshire state champs, and one, a recently found black ash not far from the Connecticut River, has been nominated by Galloway to be the new national champion!  And each champion big tree has a story.

·     *   “Years ago, way the Hell back,” says Galloway, “my friend Tucker Burr called me up and said ‘I’ve got a buttonwood tree you should see’”.  Sure enough, Burr’s buttonwood—also known as a sycamore—turned out to be the state champ, and it still stands in perfect health just outside Burr’s house off Old Drewsville Road.”

·     *   A fellow woodsman told Galloway last summer about the potential national champion black ash.  “A friend and I prowled around a swampy area down near the river—black ashes are very rare and like wet areas—and sure enough, we were able to identify it by its location and physical characteristics and measured it.  The current national champion is down in Virginia, and its number score is a lot lower than ours.  So we’re hopeful to get it certified as the national champion soon!”  If the nomination is accepted, it will be New Hampshire’s third national champion.

·     *  Galloway spotted one of his current Cheshire County champs, a gray birch, almost by accident.  Leaving Alyson’s Orchard after updating the measurement of proprietor Bob Jasse’s county champion American elm, Galloway says, “a gray birch just happened to catch my eye.  I needed a new county champion because gray birches are short-lived, and my county champion had recently succumbed.”  New measurement, new submission, new champ!

          “Big, champion trees are what I collect,” Galloway laughs.  “It’s fun, and it’s healthy.  I love to find them.  And there’s constant turnover because when we’re talking about the size of trees we’re also talking about their age.  We’ve had many champions that are dead and gone.  But as soon as one dies, we’ll measure the next one we know about and see if we can find the new champion.”

                                                --30--