Biologist finds behemoth tree in North Vancouver nearly as wide as a Boeing 747 airplane cabin
CBC
A biologist has found what is possibly one of the widest-ever recorded trees in B.C.
Ian Thomas measured a western red cedar in North Vancouver, B.C., to be somewhere between 4.8 to 5.8 metres in diameter.
If Thomas's preliminary measurements are correct, the behemoth he found in Lynn Headwaters Regional Park would barely fit inside the cabin of a Boeing 747.
The tree's diameter at breast height (DBH) still needs to be officially verified and could end up being up to a metre less than his 5.8-metre calculation, he said, depending on how it's measured on a rugged, steep slope.
Regardless of its exact size, there is no doubt the massive tree is very, very old.
"It came at the end of about a 10-hour bushwhack," Thomas told Gloria Macarenko, host of CBC's On The Coast, on Monday. "I spend a lot of my time studying satellite maps and government data sets — and just slogging through these incredible, threatened ancient forests that we're so lucky to have, some of them, here in B.C."
He and his self-described "tree hunter" colleague Colin Spratt nicknamed the "awe-inspiring" tree they found in a grove of "primordial" red cedars the North Shore Giant.
The tree is on Tsleil-Waututh Nation territories. Its director of treaty, lands and resources said western red cedars have been used by his people for everything from dugout canoes, clothing and buildings to ceremonial and medicinal uses.
"Everything from the roots to the branches to the trunks," Gabriel George said in a phone interview. "For our people, they're medicine.... The cedar tree is sacred to us."
Hearing about the find made his "heart happy," and he hoped it reminds others of the importance of B.C.'s few remaining ancient old-growth forests.
"When I saw that picture and I heard that story, it just was so uplifting," he said.
Even though this particular cedar is within an already protected area, Thomas said it's a reminder of how blessed the province is to still have such natural wonders.
"You are encountering one of the largest and oldest living things on this planet," he said. "It's almost like seeing a blue whale or a northern white rhino — this piece of this rich, wild world."
According to University of B.C. forestry professor Robert Guy, large western red cedars host "ecosystems in most of their branches."
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