Know Your Neighbours: Coastal Trees

WESTERN RED CEDAR Thuja plicata
BC’s provincial tree has been a boon to human life on the coast for thousands of years. The bark, the roots and of course the reddish, fragrant wood were all used for the essentials—food, shelter, clothing, medicine, fuel and transportation. Even now, cedar is a prized timber tree because its weather and rot-resistant wood is great for homes and rooves. Most of the biggest, oldest cedars close to sea level have been logged but there are notable exceptions you might come across in some remote cove, red giants over a thousand years old, up to four meters across and seventy tall. In many places the stumps are still impressive and show evidence of old logging techniques.

YELLOW CEDAR Chamaecyparis nootkatensis
Found only at higher elevations in southern BC, this tree gets lower and lower as the growing sights get lousier—colder, swampier and more extreme. Yellow cedar or “cypress” is usually shaggy looking, with peeling gray bark, scaly needles and a smell that gets described as anything from “lovely” to “like cougar piss”. The distinctive yellow wood is often used for carving.

WESTERN HEMLOCK Tsuga heterophylla
What they lack in beauty, hemlocks make up for in numbers—these shade tolerant trees are the most common along the coast. Droopy tops and scaly bark help identify them. Second growth stands can be so dense that it is dim or dark underneath the thick canopy, even at noon.

DOUGLAS FIR Pseudotsuga menziesii
A favorite of the forest industry, much of the second growth we paddle past is replanted doug-fir. Preferring drier sites, doug-firs have thick, fire resistant bark. Weathered veterans that are old but small and oddly shaped are common sights from a kayak. If you’re lucky, you’ve wandered through some of the few remaining patches of low lying doug-fir old growth—some of the most amazing stands of wood on the planet.

TRUE FIRS Abies amabilis & Abies grandis
Incorrectly called “balsam” by many locals and the forest industry, our true firs have thin, smooth bark with pitchy blisters. You’ll find Grand fir at sea level on the south coast—Amabilis fir towards the North. Amabilis (which means “lovely”) is a beautiful tree. The pitch (or balsam) from both was used for everything from chewing gum to shellac for paddles.

SITKA SPRUCE Picea sitchensis
Ah, spruce—tall, straight, majestic, and increasingly rare. My favorite tree of BC, an old growth sitka spruce grove is something to wax poetic about, if you’re so inclined. Even if not, seek them out because forest scenery doesn’t get much more impressive. Alas, because they are valuable timber and grow best in low valleys near the ocean, they’ve been sorely depleted. Young spruce plantations can be downright nasty to walk through—the needles are sharp.

SHORE (LODGEPOLE) PINE Pinus contorta
‘Contorta’ is an excellent species name for coastal lodgepole because it grows in some of the most extreme spots trees can grow—rocky, storm battered shorelines. Hurricane force winds contort these trees into bizarre and artistic shapes familiar to outer coast paddlers. Their short needles come in bunches of two.

PACIFIC YEW Taxus brevifolia
Yews are short, shrubby trees with flat needles that come to a point. They have small red berries and reddish, peeling bark and are found near the ocean right up to Alaska. The hard wood was used for bows and a wide range of tools, including sea urchin rakes and it is still used for carving. Taxol, an effective anti-cancer drug, was derived from the bark. Thankfully for the slow growing yew, it is now made synthetically.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN JUNIPER Juniperus scopulorum
This shrubby tree with gray, stringy bark is relatively rare in BC but grows right in our front yards—dry, rocky sites along the Strait of Georgia. Gulf Island paddlers see (and often camp under) juniper trees all the time. The harsh growing conditions they endure shape them into living art. Squeeze one of the bluish berries and you’ll be reminded of gin; juniper berries have provided that distinctive flavor for many generations of English drunks.

RED ALDER Alnus rubra
Alder is the pale-barked, toothy-leafed tree that usually grows first in disturbed sites like old roads, creeks, settlements and landings. You might have noticed such sights are very common along the coast, so you see lots of alder. Alders live short (60 yrs) lives but enrich the soil they grow in. You can often spot creeks and old roads along hillsides by the bright green trails of alder leaves amid the conifers.

BIGLEAF MAPLE Acer macrophyllum
Canadians ought to recognize the leaf shape, and bigleaf maples really do have big leaves. The trees themselves can be huge as well, and so covered in mosses and lichens they are reminiscent of southern bayou scenery. Maple wood was used to make paddles by numerous First Nations. You might have found the “helicopter” seeds to be a fascinating diversion in your younger years.

ARBUTUS (Madrone) Arbutus manziesii
Arbutus is an odd tree in many respects, not least for its smooth, peeling red bark that hides a green photosynthetic layer underneath. The thick, waxy leaves are adapted to dry sites and are not deciduous. Arbutus is a good indicator species when you’re scouting your retirement home—it marks the drier, rain shadowed portions of our coast. Older ones may not be huge but they are impressive nonetheless, strange sentinels on the rocky edges of the Strait of Georgia.