Appalachian Arborists 

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The Tsuga Search

Appalachian Arborists is helping to save our greatest hemlocks for future generations.  We are providing the technical expertise for the Eastern Native Tree Society's Tsuga Search, an effort to locate, document, and protect the largest and tallest eastern hemlock (Tsuga canadensis) trees.

Great Smoky Mountains National Park contains by far the largest remaining stands of old-growth hemlock in the southern Appalachians.  Unfortunately, hemlock woolly adelgid has already spread throughout those formerly pristine groves, and the hemlocks are beginning to die.  The National Park Service and its staff has mounted a valiant effort to treat and protect as much hemlock forest as possible, but the forests are simply to vast to save everything.  Hence, the National Park Service must identify the most valuable groves to receive the limited resources available to treat and protect the hemlocks.

To help with that effort, and ensure some of the greatest hemlocks and hemlock forests are not lost, the Eastern Native Tree Society (ENTS) initiated the Tsuga Search to identify the largest and tallest eastern hemlocks (Tsuga is Latin for hemlock).  Previous ENTS research indicated hemlock reaches its greatest sizes within the eastern half of Great Smoky Mountains National Park, so Tsuga Search research will focus on that area.  The ENTS has contracted Appalachian Arborists to conduct all of the field work and data analysis for the project.

We are currently conducting the field work phase of the project.  That effort includes hiking into remote sections of the park to survey for previously unknown giant hemlocks.  Those trees often grow far from any trails in dense tangles of rhododendron and beside cool streams that tumble down steep sided mountain valleys.  We measure the newly discovered trees to estimate their height and trunk volume.  We then climb the largest of the trees to refine those measurements, and study the trees’ surrounding.  That study includes thorough sampling of the surrounding shrubs and trees as well as coring adjacent trees to determine the age of surrounding trees.  That information will help us learn about the dynamics of the forest and understand the conditions that produce such exceptional trees.  Each of the trees documented in the Tsuga Search, and in many cases the surrounding grove, will be treated, either by Appalachian Arborists or the National Park Service, to protect it from the hemlock woolly adelgid.

To find out how you can help, click here

For more information, photographs, and updates, click here.