June 27, 1991 - Blazing a Trail Through Familar WoodsC14 Tho i imes • June 27, 1991
Blazing a Trail Through Familar Woods
By Paul Stoutenburah
We have an acre of woods in front of
our house and, like many, enjoy the
buffering effect it provides between us
and the outside world. In the winter we
can see the neighbor's lights but when
the leaves come out we see no lights
from any window. I'll go into the
woods every once in a while but with
grandchildren and guests I felt a more
easy access to its interior would benefit
us all. And so, the idea of a trail started
to formulate in my mind. This, and
three big oak trees downed in a past hur-
ricane that could be reached and cut up
for firewood, prompted me to lay out a
trail in bits and pieces.
The logical place to start would be by
the barn and then pass close to the now-
seasoning wood pile so that when I cut
the downed trees it would be an easy
matter to add them to the pile. I would
cut no other trees and as little under-
brush as possible and so the trail would
wander like a snake's path as it dodged
this tree or that bush along the way.
I passed one of my favorite trees, the
sassafras, and couldn't help but pull up
a seedling to sniff the aroma from its
roots. That's one of the rare aromas and
truly a wild and wonderful smell. It re-
minds one of root beer which it was
once used to flavor. In early times I'm
told ships from the Old World would
cross the Atlantic to our shores to bring
back cargoes of roots to be used in
herbal healing. It was a valuable early
product of the New World.
Another unusual thing about sassafras
is its leaves having three distinctly dif-
Focus on
Nature
ferent- shaped leaves on the same tree.
One is in the shape of a thumbed -mit-
ten, another is in the shape of a
"simple" leaf and the third has three
broad, blunt lobes.
A Tasty Snack
The trail would lead toward the road
and I'd be passing many familiar wood-
land plants and vines. The thorny cat -
brier, or green brier, was pushing its
new tender shoots out into new territory
and I couldn't help but snip off an occa-
sional fresh green tip and nibble on it.
They make a tasty snack on a hike and
something everyone who walks the
woodland trails should know about.
Besides the green brier there's the
Virginia creeper, wild grape and poison
ivy vines that all compete for the forest
light. Virginia creeper I enjoy particu-
larly for it won't give you an itch like
poison ivy but like poison ivy has
beautiful leaves turning all shades of red
in the fall. It has dark black berries at
this time while poison ivy with its
characteristic three leaves has white ber-
ries.
The wild grape or frost grape some-
times grows one to two inches in diam-
eter and reaches the treetops, providing
wonderful wild -bird food through its
rather tart fruit. When they are lower
down where you can reach them and
have enough patience (you have to pick
a lot), they make a great jelly.
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Photo by Paul Stoutenburgh
POISON IVY —Most of us think of poison ivy as a low shrub but given
a chance to climb it can grow to two inches in diameter and spread its
foliage 60 feet up in a tree.
As I walked along marking I couldn't
help but notice how soft my steps were.
I was walking on a thick carpet of forest
duff. The dead leaves of last year lay on
top of a deeper layer of older leaves in
the process of decay. This was nature's
own fertilizer being applied at its own
slow rate. This would be my pathway.
At one particular point there seemed
to be a lot of Solomon's seal, a true
woodland flower. It had already blos-
somed with its cluster of small creamy -
white flowers and was now in the pro-
cess of creating berries that will turn
crimson red in the fall and provide its
share of wildlife food. Perhaps those
seed clusters accounted for the patch of
Solomon's seal I was passing by.
I veered around an old dogwood tree I
watched for years and was sorry to see it
had already taken some damage from the
blight that is affecting all dogwoods
along our entire eastern seaboard. Many
are concerned that this blight that even-
tually kills the tree will be as devastat-
ing to the dogwoods as the chestnut and
elm blights were to them. Those dis-
eases wiped out two of the great
American trees that once ruled our for-
est.
1938 Hurricane's Damage
Most of the trees in our woods are
typical Long Island growth made up of
black and white oak with a sprinkling
of hickory throughout. It's all second
growth and the result of the great hurri-
cane of 1938. There is still evidence of
that devastating blow throughout my
woods. The mounds of stump dirt still
mark the place where the giants of that
time went down. I can even tell the ex-
act direction the wind came from for all
the stump mounds lay in the same
direction. That storm must have leveled
this area. That was 53 years ago and I
estimate the trees standing today to be
about 60 years old. That would make
them saplings back in 1938 that proba-
bly bent with the wind and eventually
grew to the now present woods.
Sarsaparilla, a common plant found
throughout the East End woods, was
scattered about so thickly that I didn't
feel bad when I had to pass over a few
on my trail blazing. They have a golf -
ball -size flower under a canopy of
leaves.
My trail will lead past the downed
trees I'd later be cutting up for firewood.
Then down to the road and up past the
little pond I'd built as a woodland bird-
bath and then circle back to the wood
pile. I'd clear the part up to where the
trees were down and at a later date com-
plete the rest.
I'd made a start and like so many
things in life once you've made a com-
mitment the rest will follow. Right
now I can enjoy my woodland path and
let's hope my grandchildren will enjoy
its scents and secrets that I have come
to know.
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