Fragments From Floyd

Look closely. What do you think of hemlock's spare, no-nonsense theme for the future? By the end of the decade, this is the only style you'll see in what remains standing of this species. And by the end of the decade after that, the design will be even sleeker--trunk only, at least parts of some, will still stand. But without any of the messy needle-leaves.

This new model hemlock is not like its cluttered, dark green predecessor. The old design had boughs bending to touch the ground below, shading the mountain streams where they grew. The new model lets lots of natural light through to the forest floor. And this edition of Tsuga canadensis will not litter the ground with those pesky little baby hemlocks growing in the sheltering boughs of the parent tree.

As you can see here already, greener, leafier species--like this poison ivy--will be quick to take advantage of the new sunlight, growing up into barkless hemlock trellises that are becoming abundant throughout the eastern US.

Chestnuts, of course, were a problem after their model phase-out eighty years ago. They resisted rot and their trunks and limbs persist in our woods even today. Hemlocks, in their new incarnation of the new century will rot quickly, leaving only the memory of tall, black-green trees interspersed among the white pines. Then that generation of human forest visitors who still remember will die out, and Canada hemlock will not even persist in memory of the eastern woods that once were.