By Tim King
Special to the Leader
There is a long stand of white birch trees located about 40 minutes south of Millinocket that I’ve enjoyed looking at for almost 20 years now. Each time I stumble across it, it always manages to surprise me. This particular stand is probably about 500 feet long, 100 feet wide and consists almost entirely of what seem to be several hundred white birches.
Over the years, I’ve come to see most birch trees only as white accents against a predominately brown and green landscape of pines, oaks and maples. They seem to appear sometimes randomly as solitary beacons of contrast in the forest.
I once got to thinking that maybe their location could mean something more. Maybe birches are some kind of natural indicator line of measurement. I think that in this way, birches could have acted as the first road signs long ago. Can’t you just picture an early settler or Native American giving directions like – “turn left at the big stream and follow the trail for 12 birches, then walk towards the setting sun.” In a sea of green, the white birch stands apart from all others.
But did they also need to stand apart from others just like it too? Are birches the snob tree of the arbor world? For a while, I thought that this was the case. Until I stumbled across, rather, I drove past, that large group of beautiful birch trees up north. That’s right, I drove past them, probably at about 70 mph (OK, maybe a little more).
You see, after the hundreds of miles of walking, hiking and mountain biking I’ve done over the years, I’ve never seen a more perfect stand of birches than the one at mile marker 213 of Route 95, somewhere between Bangor and Millinocket.
Rather than a rest area for food, drink or gas, I now anxiously await this area as a rest for my eyes. After miles and miles of watching the same mix of green pass by, the abrupt change to white (whether it’s day or night) helps to break me out of the daze I inevitably find myself in at that part of the journey. “Wake up!” it seems to yell to me. “You’re almost there!” Thank God.
It doesn’t move, grow or shrink at any perceptible degree since I’ve been traveling up there. But I’m sure that it has changed over the years. At some point, I’d really like to spend some time there – just 15 or 20 minutes of walking through the heart of the stand from end to end so that I could see what they see. At least something more than the five or six seconds it takes to drive by it.
Maybe I’m not the only rubbernecking motorist that whizzes by on their way to “somewhere else” wondering, for a few seconds at least, how this group of trees came to be. Were they planted there on purpose? If so, when and why? Did the tree planter just get lazy and drop all the seedlings in one place and call it a day? Or, if it did happen naturally, why did only birches end up thriving here?
I’ve driven almost every mile of Route 95 from Florida to Houlton and I’ve never seen a larger, more defined section of birch trees. Maybe these are some type of “Super Birch” trees that are more powerful, more potent, more “something” than their brothers and sisters who are content only to coexist quietly with larger pines and maples.
This tiny parcel of land, with its pronounced contrast in landscape colors, is comforting to people like me who take the time to think about such things. But I wonder if the birches themselves look longingly to the other side of the highway where green pines wave slowly with the speedy passing of each Midland, Schneider or Wal-Mart truck.
Surely, they would see the benefit of protection from the harsh winds of winter by an evergreen in their midst or enjoy watching the “helicopter” seedlings of the maple flutter to the ground.
At first, I thought that perhaps this oasis of birches amidst a forest of green would be a kind of birch utopia. A place where everyone was equal, everyone was provided with the same exact opportunities. A place “where everybody knows your name...and they’re always glad you came,” as the song goes.
There is no doubt that there is a comfort in being in such a place. You know that someone always has your back. The odds of something bad happening to you are greatly reduced and the theory of strength in numbers seems to sound pretty good. That is until something bad does come along. Suddenly, now, because everyone is the same, everyone is at risk.
I’ve heard stories of some disease wiping out most of chestnut trees in North America in the first half of the 20th Century. The huge trees once ruled the forests from Maine to Florida, but in less than 50 years they were almost completely wiped out.
If something like that was to occur with birches, this stand wouldn’t stand a chance as the disease would quickly pass from branch to branch, tree to tree. Within a matter of days, depending on how the wind blew, the entire population would be infected. The likely survivors in this scenario would be those birches living amongst the other types of trees, away from the perceived safe place where everyone was the same.
So I guess what I’ve learned is that we all need a little space sometimes and we should try and seek out diversity when and where we can, for the good of everyone.
I’ll still look forward to seeing that wonderful stand of white birch trees on our trips north, and for that day I actually stop in for a visit.
But my appreciation will now also be coupled with sadness as I realize how oblivious they are to the dangers of surrounding yourself with yourself.
Tim King is a freelance writer who sees the forest and the trees from his home in Scarborough. He can be reached at: sylvan.sauntering@gmail.com.