The Golden Gate as seen from the Grizzly Peak Road in the Berkeley Hills

San Francisco as seen from the Grizzly Peak Road in the Berkeley Hills

 

 

San Francisco as seen from Mt. Tamalpais on the way to Muir Woods

 

 

Muir Woods

Only a few miles north of San Francisco, in a isolated canyon, grows the ancient coast redwood forest known the world over as Muir Woods. The park offers solitude, interpretive displays and programs, and numerous hiking trails. Come stroll through 1,000 year old giant trees towering 260 feet high and find out why famed naturalist John Muir called this… “…the best tree-lovers monument that could possibly be found in all the forests of the world.”

http://www.visitmuirwoods.com

 

John Muir (1838-1914) was America's most famous and influential naturalist and conservationist, and founder of the Sierra Club.

 

 

 

 

Muir Woods

The redwood is the glory of the Coast Range. It extends along the western slope, in a nearly continuous belt about ten miles wide, from beyond the Oregon boundary to the south of Santa Cruz, a distance of nearly four hundred miles, and in massive, sustained grandeur and closeness of growth surpasses all the other timber woods of the world.

John Muir

 

 

Any fool can destroy trees. They cannot run away; and if they could, they would still be destroyed, — chased and hunted down as long as fun or a dollar could be got out of their bark hides, branching horns, or magnificent bole backbones.... Through all the wonderful, eventful centuries since Christ’s time — and long before that — God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease, avalanches, and a thousand straining, leveling tempests and floods; but he cannot save them from fools, — only Uncle Sam can do that.

~John Muir, “The American Forests,” August 1897

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

AS OLD AS THE DINOSAURS — ALMOST
The earliest redwoods showed up on Earth shortly after the dinosaurs – and before flowers, birds, spiders… and, of course, humans. Redwoods have been around for about 240 million years and in California for at least 20 million years, compared to about 200,000 years for “modern” humans.

https://sempervirens.org/discover-redwoods/facts-history/

 

 

Redwoods once grew throughout the Northern Hemisphere. The first redwood fossils date back more than 200 million years to the Jurassic period. Before commercial logging and clearing began in the 1850s, coast redwoods naturally occurred in an estimated 2 million acres (the size of three Rhode Islands) along California’s coast from south of Big Sur to just over the Oregon border. When gold was discovered in 1849, hundreds of thousands of people came to California, and redwoods were logged extensively to satisfy the explosive demand for lumber and resources. Today, only 5 percent of the original old-growth coast redwood forest remains, along a 450-mile coastal strip. Most of the coast redwood forest is now young. The largest surviving stands of ancient coast redwoods are found in Humboldt Redwoods State Park, Redwood National and State Parks and Big Basin Redwoods State Park.

The native people of California did not typically cut down coast redwoods, but used fallen trees to make planks for houses and hollowed out logs for canoes. The natives also regularly used common redwood forest plants. Read more about uses of redwood forest plants through our Redwood Forest Plant Guide.

 

 

 

 

 

The Redwoods

Written in 1932 by Joseph P. Strauss, Chief Engineer, Golden Gate Bridge and Highway District 

Here, sown by the Creator's hand.
In serried ranks, the Redwoods stand:
No other clime is honored so,
No other lands their glory know.

The greatest of Earth's living forms,
Tall conquerors that laugh at storms;
Their challenge still unanswered rings,
Through fifty centuries of kings.

The nations that with them were young,
Rich empires, with their forts far-flung,
Lie buried now-their splendor gone:
But these proud monarchs still live on.

So shall they live, when ends our days,
When our crude citadels decay;
For brief the years allotted man,
But infinite perennials' span.

This is their temple, vaulted high,
And here, we pause with reverent eye,
With silent tongue and awestruck soul;
For here we sense life's proper goal:

To be like these, straight, true and fine,
to make our world like theirs, a shrine;
Sink down, Oh, traveler, on your knees,
God stands before you in these trees.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cathedral Grove in Muir Woods

Sturdy Survivors
Redwoods live so long – and are treasured by humans for building – because they are extremely resistant to insects, fire and rot. At one time, San Francisco’s building codes required redwood lumber to be used in the foundations of new structures. A redwood’s bark can be one foot thick, and it contains tannin which protects the tree from fire, insects, fungus and diseases.

https://sempervirens.org/discover-redwoods/facts-history/?gclid=COjkru729tICFQiDfgodRRgNcQ

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

HERE AND ONLY HERE
Coast redwoods grow only one place on Earth – right here on the Pacific coast, from Big Sur to southern Oregon. Earlier in the Earth’s history, redwoods had a much wider range, including western North America and the coasts of Europe and Asia.

https://sempervirens.org/discover-redwoods/facts-history/?gclid=COjkru729tICFQiDfgodRRgNcQ

 

 

As a wilderness explorer, he is renowned for his exciting adventures in California's Sierra Nevada, among Alaska's glaciers, and world wide travels in search of nature's beauty. As a writer, he taught the people of his time and ours the importance of experiencing and protecting our natural heritage. His writings contributed greatly to the creation of Yosemite, Sequoia, Mount Rainier, Petrified Forest, and Grand Canyon National Parks. Dozens of places are named after John Muir, including the Muir Woods National Monument, the John Muir Trail, Muir College (UCSD), and many schools.

http://vault.sierraclub.org/john_muir_exhibit/about/

 

 

Trees are crucial to maintaining a stable human-friendly climate. Studies show that coast redwoods capture more carbon dioxide (CO2) from our cars, trucks and power plants than any other tree on Earth. And, as the climate changes, the redwood forests in the Santa Cruz Mountains are one of very few places that can provide a refuge for plants and animals here to survive, because the area has many microclimates, is cooled by coastal summertime fog and is still largely unpaved.

https://sempervirens.org/discover-redwoods/facts-history/?gclid=COjkru729tICFQiDfgodRRgNcQ

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The words and deeds of John Muir helped inspire President Theodore Roosevelt's innovative conservation programs, including establishing the first National Monuments by Presidential Proclamation, and Yosemite National Park by congressional action. In 1892, John Muir and other supporters formed the Sierra Club "to make the mountains glad." John Muir was the Club's first president, an office he held until his death in 1914. Muir's Sierra Club has gone on to help establish a series of new National Parks and a National Wilderness Preservation System.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TALLEST TREES ON EARTH
Your local coast redwood tree can grow to 300 feet or more, compared to the tallest pine tree at 268 feet or the tallest tanoak at 162 feet — yet its root system is only 6 to 12 feet deep. Redwoods create the strength to withstand powerful winds and floods by extending their roots more than 50 feet from the trunk and living in groves where their roots can intertwine.

https://sempervirens.org/discover-redwoods/facts-history/?gclid=COjkru729tICFQiDfgodRRgNcQ

 

 

The redwood is one of the few conifers that sprout from the stump and roots, and it declares itself willing to begin immediately to repair the damage of the lumberman and also that of the forest-burner.

~John Muir, “The American Forests,” August 1897

 

 

 

 

John Muir (right) with John Burroughs 
Literary naturalist and essayist from the Catskills of New York.
John Burroughs was one of America's foremost nature writers. He was a biographer of Walt Whitman and is famous for his love of birds.
Burroughs accompanied Muir on the Alaska Harriman Expedition and other trips, including visits to Grand Canyon and Yosemite.
Burroughs wrote of Muir after their second meeting: "He is a poet and almost a Seer. Something ancient and far-away in the look of his eyes. He could not sit down in the corner of the landscape, as Thoreau did, he must have a continent for his playground..... Probably the truest lover of Nature.... we have yet had... [But here is] a little prolix... Ask him to tell you his famous dog story and you will get the whole theory of glaciation thrown in."
After Muir's death, Burroughs made this comment: "A unique character - greater as a talker than as a writer - he loved personal combat and shone in it. He hated writing and composed with difficulty, though his books have charm of style; but his talk came easily and showed him at his best. I shall greatly miss him."

http://vault.sierraclub.org/john_muir_exhibit/people/burroughs.aspx

 

 

Best Mom in the world.

 

 

Best Mom in the world.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SEE 2,000-YEAR-OLD REDWOODS HERE
Officially, the oldest living coast redwood is at least 2,200 years old, but foresters believe some coast redwoods may be much older.

https://sempervirens.org/discover-redwoods/facts-history/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cathedral Grove in Muir Woods

For more of my photos at Muir Woods, go to:

http://www.ronhenggeler.com/San%20Francisco/Mount%20Tamalpais/MtTamIndex3.htm

 

ANCIENT OLD-GROWTH – AND ASPIRING YOUNGSTERS
Most of the redwoods we see are about 50-150 years old. That’s equivalent to about age 2-6 in human years! Coast redwoods can grow 100 feet in their first 50 years, so they quickly look like grown-ups. So, when you walk or ride through the Santa Cruz Mountains, remember you are in a nursery of young redwoods that, if protected, can live for 2,000 years and can help rebuild a healthy redwood forest for people, wildlife and future generations.

https://sempervirens.org/discover-redwoods/facts-history/?gclid=COjkru729tICFQiDfgodRRgNcQ

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Muir Woods

Standing at the base of Earth’s tallest tree, the coast redwood, is one of life’s most humbling and amazing experiences. These California trees can reach higher than a 30-floor skyscraper (more than 320 feet), so high that the tops are out of sight.

Their trunks can grow more than 27 feet wide, about eight paces by an average adult person! Even more incredible: These trees can live for more than 2,000 years. Some coast redwoods living today were alive during the time of the Roman Empire.

https://www.savetheredwoods.org/redwoods/coast-redwoods/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

John Muir (1838-1914) was America's most famous and influential naturalist and conservationist, and founder of the Sierra Club.