Conifers get a bad reputation in this country. Sometimes justified, in that there are places where crude splashes of Sitka spruce or the like have been daubed over hilltops in a most unnatural configuration. But Sitka and other conifers have a material value. They grow quickly and can be harvested and bring a return to their owners, be it the official Coillte or individual private planters. It is said that this can be achieved in something like 40 years. And a dictum of some foresters is: the ultimate fate of the tree is timber. We know our need of a huge injection of broadleaves such as oak, beech and others, for monocultures are best avoided. And the public does have an eye for a sturdy, long-lived oak, say. But there are also beautiful conifers and over the past few weeks there has been none more pleasing to the eye than the Douglas fir. At this stage, about 20 years old, it is a dark green pyramid, adorned with the most graceful of all cones. They are, for some reason, described in some of the major books as egg-shaped, though the illustration shows a pointed cone of about three inches long and less than an inch across. Until a couple of weeks ago, they were light green to yellow.
They wore what the layman might describe as small triangular scales from which hang short, green pointed leaves or stalks. Hugh Johnson finds a similarity with a trident. The seeds come later, on a single wing. There may, of course, be variations of the Douglas Fir. Johnson says this of it: "With the greatest respect to the giant sequoias, the Douglas fir (pseudotsuga menziesii) can fairly be called the world's biggest beautiful tree." He disagrees with botanists who call it pseudotsuga, "for that means false hemlock . . . It was never a hemlock and never meant to be." Menzies was first to collect it, in 1791 says Johnson. David Douglas of the London Horticultural Society brought some back in 1827 and trees planted in 1828 still stand today.
According to Herbert L. Edlin, author of The Tree Key, one Douglas fir felled on Vancouver Island in 1895 had even then reached a height of 135 metres or 417 feet "taller than any tree standing today". This book was printed in 1978. Y