Sunday I spent most of my time in the park measuring mature trees to estimate their ages. I was surprised to find 90-year-old Red Oaks and Tuliptrees, which would indicate that this patch was no longer farmed as of about 1925. I also found a small outcrop of bedrock—I’m still trying to puzzle out the geology map to understand exactly what this rock is.
I’ve spent so much interest on this bloom of Chicken of the Woods, but not on the tree that it’s growing on. It turns out that it was a substantial Black Cherry (Prunus serotina), now deadfall. You can see the dark red wood, somewhat weathered, in the image. The tree had fallen across the trail; park managers would have sawed it into several large chunks, stretching through the woods toward the east and the housing subdivision. The chunks form a line about 100 feet long and end in a tangle of former canopy branches. This was a big tree.