grouper52
Masterpiece
Well here's this big boy that Eric has alluded to on several occasions here recently. 8" base, about three feet long.
Fun story: I'm up on Vancouver Island early last November with Dan Robinson, writing/photographing a chapter about his collecting adventures for the upcoming book (tease, tease - except for a few here). We're about a half mile back into this alpine bog, slogging through the muck and rain in the late afternoon after a day of collecting stunted treasures for him, and a day of bad weather photographing and recording for me.
He's after some big Alaska Yellow cedar he root enhanced the year before. We locate it. It's enormous. With the strength of an ox, literally, he doesn't need my help, but I offer it anyway, and he encourages me instead to look around and see if there are any others worth collecting. I discover this guy sitting on a small hillock, and call to him. He comes over to look at it, and surprises me by saying I should collect it for myself. It's a MUCH bigger tree than I have expected to come home with.
Well, I dig around and it seems to have a viable root ball in close, in addition to the main roots running off deep into the surrounding bog with have to be cut through with a saw. So I do my best over the next hour to collect it, and once it is freed, and its enormous root ball wrapped up, I find out it weighs a ton. About this time Dan has freed and wrapped his monster as well. He says, let's go. I go over to help him carry his tree out to the truck, but he says he'll get his by himself if I want to get mine by myself, otherwise he'll get his and come back to help me with mine.
I'm impressed with this monster, a real prize, and I decide to add to its appeal by having a real story behind it, so I put the crotch (where that large cut off branch meets the trunk in the second photo) over my shoulder, and Dan does a fireman's carry with his tree, and we sludge off together in the now-fading light. It's exhausting. Really tough going. We're up to our knees in hidden underwater holes at times, and Dan goes face down into the muck once when he steps in one, preferring to save the tree in his arms rather than keep his face out of the bog. My heart's beating practically out of my chest at times, a bit worrisome after a heart attack 18 months before, but my ticker holds up. Certainly the longest half mile I've ever traveled, and one of the toughest hours I've ever spent, but I get this treasure out all on my own, with great pride and a great story to boot.
So, after about nine months wrapped in plastic, it is putting out new growth towards the end of this season - a safe time to containerize it. I then spent a few minutes last evening with a brass brush cleaning it up a bit, and tonight snapped its first photos, one from one side, and the other on the other side and a little towards the base and down from above.
As you can imagine, this will be carving heaven, probably starting this winter. It's got the flimsiest of foliage going on right now, but I couldn't care less at this point - it's truly about the trunk and the deadwood and the live veins covered with gorgeous bark. I have no idea how I will style this bad boy, nor do I care at this point. My collection lacks even a single broom or formal upright, but I doubt THIS will become one.
In honor of Japanese tradition, I am thinking of a naming ceremony at some point, complete with Shinto priests. I would like to call it Sasquatch.
Enjoy.
Fun story: I'm up on Vancouver Island early last November with Dan Robinson, writing/photographing a chapter about his collecting adventures for the upcoming book (tease, tease - except for a few here). We're about a half mile back into this alpine bog, slogging through the muck and rain in the late afternoon after a day of collecting stunted treasures for him, and a day of bad weather photographing and recording for me.
He's after some big Alaska Yellow cedar he root enhanced the year before. We locate it. It's enormous. With the strength of an ox, literally, he doesn't need my help, but I offer it anyway, and he encourages me instead to look around and see if there are any others worth collecting. I discover this guy sitting on a small hillock, and call to him. He comes over to look at it, and surprises me by saying I should collect it for myself. It's a MUCH bigger tree than I have expected to come home with.
Well, I dig around and it seems to have a viable root ball in close, in addition to the main roots running off deep into the surrounding bog with have to be cut through with a saw. So I do my best over the next hour to collect it, and once it is freed, and its enormous root ball wrapped up, I find out it weighs a ton. About this time Dan has freed and wrapped his monster as well. He says, let's go. I go over to help him carry his tree out to the truck, but he says he'll get his by himself if I want to get mine by myself, otherwise he'll get his and come back to help me with mine.
I'm impressed with this monster, a real prize, and I decide to add to its appeal by having a real story behind it, so I put the crotch (where that large cut off branch meets the trunk in the second photo) over my shoulder, and Dan does a fireman's carry with his tree, and we sludge off together in the now-fading light. It's exhausting. Really tough going. We're up to our knees in hidden underwater holes at times, and Dan goes face down into the muck once when he steps in one, preferring to save the tree in his arms rather than keep his face out of the bog. My heart's beating practically out of my chest at times, a bit worrisome after a heart attack 18 months before, but my ticker holds up. Certainly the longest half mile I've ever traveled, and one of the toughest hours I've ever spent, but I get this treasure out all on my own, with great pride and a great story to boot.
So, after about nine months wrapped in plastic, it is putting out new growth towards the end of this season - a safe time to containerize it. I then spent a few minutes last evening with a brass brush cleaning it up a bit, and tonight snapped its first photos, one from one side, and the other on the other side and a little towards the base and down from above.
As you can imagine, this will be carving heaven, probably starting this winter. It's got the flimsiest of foliage going on right now, but I couldn't care less at this point - it's truly about the trunk and the deadwood and the live veins covered with gorgeous bark. I have no idea how I will style this bad boy, nor do I care at this point. My collection lacks even a single broom or formal upright, but I doubt THIS will become one.
In honor of Japanese tradition, I am thinking of a naming ceremony at some point, complete with Shinto priests. I would like to call it Sasquatch.
Enjoy.