



Many of the giant trees in the state park are estimated to be more than 1,000 years old. The storm was just too much for it," the post read.Īccording to the California Department of Parks and Recreation, the oldest known giant sequoia tree is over 3000 years old. "This iconic and still living tree – the tunnel tree – enchanted many visitors. The Calaveras Big Trees Association posted Allday's photos of the felled tree on its Facebook page Sunday afternoon, prompting over 1,700 comments. When the already mostly dead tree hit the ground on Sunday, it shattered and is now completely unrecognisable, said JimAllday, a volunteer at Calaveras Big Trees State Park. The drive-thru tree had a diameter of 6.7m and was about 2,000 years old, said Tony Tealdi, a supervising ranger at California State Parks. The largest tree species in the world, sequoias can reach diameters up to 8.3m and have shallow root systems that make them vulnerable to toppling. The tunnel was limited to pedestrians in recent decades. The tunnel that made the tree famous and ultimately weakened it was carved into its trunk in the 1880s to allow tourists to pass through, first with horses and buggies and later with cars. "I feel like it's part of my personal history. "It was so different and so odd," Crawford said, adding that he recently visited the tree again and relived those memories. "It was madness."Ĭrawford, 36, was stunned by the sequoia's size: When his family of four tried to join hands around the tree they discovered they couldn't even come close. "I remember I was walking through the tree and thinking, 'I'm inside of the tree right now!"' he said. Sumner Crawford of Charleston, South Carolina, remembers every detail of his first visit to the tree as a kid in the early 1990s. "There's this giant tree everyone remembers, and it's going to be laying there in plain sight. "In the blink of an eye, it's gone," he said. Most shrubs grow best at least 10 feet from the base of the redwood. Kathleen Shaeffer Design, Exterior Spaces. maxima, zones 8 to 11) and Pacific trillium ( Trillium ovatum, zones 5 to 8). Ripper said he can't believe that a storm felled such a massive, sturdy-looking tree. Other options for western natives that grow well under redwoods include crevice alumroot ( Heuchera micrantha, zones 5 to 10), island alumroot ( H. But that particular tree and being able to walk underneath it and touch it was quite a memorable moment and something I won't soon forget." "I was blown away," said John Ripper, a 55-year-old printer in Northville, Michigan.
