Access to this tree is via the Elk Creek trail described below, or via a forest service road. The road is steep and narrow, and one must be careful of logging trucks descending. Use extreme caution!
There is an ample paved parking area at the Big Tree Recreation Area with a well maintained trail that leads through a stand of large port orford cedars and other species with informative signs. The trail ends at a a wooden viewing platform where this giant tree can be appreciated in all of its glory. It is really difficult to photograph in this setting. And, as of my visit, there is now a geocache here.
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Elk Creek Trail, located near Elk Creek, offers a mile of hiking and several picnic sites. The trail leaves Forest Service Road #33, and splits-the left fork follows Elk Creek for a short distance to a scenic viewpoint of the Elk Creek Falls.
The right fork switches back through a stand of old-growth timber and continues on through a stand of younger trees to the Big Tree picnic area. Big Tree Park contains a number of giant specimens of different conifer species, including the worlds largest Port-Orford cedar tree.
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Port Orford cedar (Chamaecyparis lawsoniana) is a coniferous tree native to southern Oregon and northern California. This 1922 photo shows several mature cedars growing in a mixed stand of spruce and other conifers located on Coos Bay Lumber Company land near Wooden Rock Creek.
Port Orford cedars can live for hundreds of years. The largest living example, located in the Siskiyou National Forest, is more than 230 feet high and 12 feet in diameter, though even larger specimens existed before industrial logging began in the late nineteenth century. Some of their stumps, up to 20 feet across, can still be found.
The aromatic soft wood of Port Orford cedar has long been valued by Native peoples, who used it to build ceremonial houses and sweat lodges. The Hoopa Valley Tribe of northern California, for example, considers the tree central to their ceremonial life, referring to it as “the Healer.” The wood is also sought after by the Japanese, who use the wood for shrines, temples, and arrow shafts.
Because of its durability, beauty, and scarcity, Port Orford cedar is considered to be the most valuable wood harvested in western North America. A single mature specimen can fetch $50,000 on the market. Because of its high value, the great majority of mature trees have been logged off over the years.
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In Europe and the UK, Port Orford white cedar, is known for its grace in ornamental garden plantings and for its versatile wood and foliage colour. As logs, it is particularly highly valued in east Asia with large amounts being exported from the US to Japan where it is in high demand for making coffins. It brings higher prices than almost any other conifer in the United States. The wood is light and durable and due to the straightness of its grain, it is also one of the preferred woods for the manufacture of arrow shafts.This valuable tree, however, has a very limited range and an uncertain future. Management of Port Orford Cedar has become impossible in much of its range since the introduction of this fatal root rot and old growth forests are being depleted rapidly and the use of second growth forests is complicated because early growth is relatively slow. The commercial future of one of the most beautiful and potentially useful trees will depend on development of practices that minimise infection by root rot.
It is a large evergreen coniferous tree regularly reaching 200 feet or 50-70 metres tall with feathery foliage in flat sprays, usually somewhat glaucous blue-green in colour. It was first discovered near Port Orford in Oregon and successfully introduced into cultivation in the United Kingdom in 1854 by collectors working for the Lawson & Son nursery in Edinburgh, Scotland, So this is what these beauties look like.after which it was named as Lawson's Cypress by the describing botanist, Andrew Murray.
The wood is very close-grained, hard, strong, durable, easily worked, light, abounding in fragrant resin and acid resistant. It has been used in many applications including battery separators, mill work, boats, railway sleepers. As one of the world's finest timbers, it is also widely used for flooring, fencing, making boats and has been used to make broom handles. It is now in short supply due to over-harvesting without replanting.
Up until the introduction of this disease, the wood was extremely resistant to insects and decay. For many decades, Port Orford Cedar has been the wood of choice for the finest archery wood arrow shafts because of its characteristics of strength and straight grain.
Port Orford Cedar oil, known commercially as Rose of Cedar, is used all over the world today for aromatherapy, cosmetics, personal and environmental deodorisers, pet grooming products, insect repellents, cleaners and disinfectants. The oil has anti-bacterial, anti-fungal and anti-viral properties as well as keeping bugs and insects away. It is all natural, non-toxic and an ideal essential oil.
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