NEBRASKAland Magazine is dedicated to outstanding photography and informative writing with an engaging mix of articles and photos highlighting Nebraska’s outdoor activities, parklands, wildlife, history and people.
Issue link: http://mag.outdoornebraska.gov/i/902203
40 NEBRASKAland • NOVEMBER 2017 N ebraska Game and Parks Commission properties include some very beautiful and interesting habitats and ecological systems, and each region of the state contains a variety of wetlands, grasslands and woodlands. Consequently, unique plant specimens may be found at our parks and wildlife management areas. Ponca State Park, one the agency's flagship parks, is located on bluffs overlooking the Missouri River just 2 miles north of the town of Ponca. Growing in the interior of park woodlands is a bur oak (Quercus macrocarpa) estimated at 373 years old. This "Old Wolf Tree" was so named and designated as a "Nebraska Heritage Tree" by the Nebraska Community Forestry Council and the Nebraska Forest Service in 2006. Foresters often name/identify old, large and solitary trees of any species that occupy considerable space in their neck of the woods as "wolf trees," so named because they are wolfing up space. These old specimens somehow gained a foothold – through superior genetics, a slightly better niche of site conditions or escape by fire or animal browsing – to overtop and outcompete adjacent trees. And with this advantage in growth, a wolf tree can even shade out any seedlings that emerge beneath. Once a tree gains elder status, it will reign supreme over its section of woodlands until it grows old and dies. O The Ponca Wolf Oak was core sampled in 1964, we believe by staff of the now Nebraska Forest Service, and estimated at 320 years. To age a tree, foresters use an increment borer to drill and extract a soda straw-sized core of wood from the tree stem. If the drill can reach the pith center of the tree from the perimeter of the trunk, a sample containing each annual growth ring may be extracted. After adding about five years to the count of rings, to account for seedling emergence and development, a reasonably accurate estimate of the age may be derived. Our current age estimate is determined by adding 53 years to the original estimate in 1964. Colleagues of mine agree that this tree is undoubtedly one of the oldest in Nebraska. As a timeline perspective, this tree may have emerged as a seedling on the year that William Penn, who founded the Pennsylvania Colony, was born. Currently the Ponca Wolf Oak is 9.8 feet in circumference. Interestingly, the Nebraska Champion Tree Registry, maintained by the Nebraska Forest Service, lists the State Champion (largest) bur oak at 18.7 feet in circumference, which grows somewhere in Peru County. But to my knowledge the State Champion bur oak has never been core dated. The Ponca Wolf Oak exhibits very smooth bark when compared to typical bur oaks, indicating very slow growth at least in recent years. Slow growth translates to very narrow annual growth rings. So likely the Ponca tree could be much older than the State Champion bur oak, which is twice the circumference. O The park woodlands looked much different during pre-settlement in 1644. Historically, fire was the major ecological force in the Missouri River bluff ecosystem forming a mosaic of plant communities. Dense forests of basswood, red oak, black oak and hickories grew in somewhat fire- protected bottoms and on low north- and east-facing slopes. Higher on these slopes were woodlands dominated by The Old Wolf Oak Tree Ponca State Park tree is one of the oldest in Nebraska By Mike Groenewold, Park Horticulturist The Ponca Wolf Oak has fairly smooth bark in comparison to typical bur oaks. ld bur oaks are like the tribal elders of the forest. Throughout their life they have thrived and they have suffered, but they endure – eventually outliving all their neighbors (including us). They are a patient tree – never in a hurry. They are slow to put leaves on and slow to let them go. Other trees foolishly expend their energy, grow impatiently, and search for their day in the sun. Meanwhile the old elders of the forest witness their foolish and frivolous expenditure of resources. We should all take some good advice from these old oaks." – Jeff Fields, Regional Park Superintendent, Northeast Region "O JEFF FIELDS JEFF FIELDS PHOTO BY JENNY NGUYEN