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Fifth Oldest Live Oak Tree

One of the highlights of the state park at which we stayed was the fifth oldest live oak tree in Florida.  We walked down a short path that led to it.

Fifth Oldest Live Oak

It’s several hundred years old, and is 10 feet in diameter (trunk), stands 83 feet high and has a spread of 133 feet!  I can’t even fit the entire tree into the image, and this is zooming my lens to the most wide-angle setting it has!  And, in the image below, you can see how huge the diameter is.  I was standing as close as I could to the tree to still get the center in the viewfinder.

Center of the Live Oak

Live Oak Branch

These trees were once sought after by ship builders, but now they provide food and shelter for several animal species, as well as a place of attachment for various air plants, mosses and ferns.  You can see some resurrection ferns attached to one of its branches here.

Follow the Branches

I was just fascinated by how the branches just formed some wonderful natural sculpture.  I almost couldn’t get enough images of them!

Reaching

I found this image especially illustrative of how the branches just reach and reach, seeming to go on forever.  I wonder if these were the types of trees that Margaret Mitchell had in mind when she described Twelve Oaks (Ashley Wilkes plantation) in Gone With the Wind.

Walkway Past the Live Oak

I just had to walk all around it, marveling at how small I felt and how safe I sort of felt under its boughs.  I could imagine sitting under it reading away the afternoon…..

Enjoy!