Return of the Majestic Longleaf Pines By Nano Riley
TOM BENSON
CHARLIE A. SMITH
more with no branches, a perfect piece of wood that’s easy to harvest.” Most of the old trees here in Pinellas were gone by 1934, and mostly sand or slash pine, two faster-growing native species, were replanted in their place, according to Robinson. Our native longleaf pine (Pinus palustris), the largest southern yellow pine, was used for everything from buildings to great ships. Timbers were perfect for tall masts and spars of sailing ships, while the pine tar caulked hulls and decks. The declining pine ecosystem also supports diverse wildlife, including threatened and endangered species such as the redcockaded woodpecker that nests only in old-growth longleaf pine. Colonies of gopher tortoises burrow in the sandy loam
When Spanish explorer Pánfilo de Narváez landed in 1528 on the shores of Boca Ciega Bay he called the spot “Punta Pinal,” or point of pines. Pine forests once towered over nearly 90 million acres along the southeastern coastal plain, from North Carolina to east Texas, but 300 years of intense logging and settlement have diminished the forests, leaving a fragmented patchwork between mushrooming urban sprawl. Except for the logging forests of the panhandle, there are few large stands of pine remaining outside of state parks. “Logging was a main way to make money here in Florida,” said Steve Robinson, commercial horticulture agent for the Pinellas County Extension Service in Largo. “A lumberman stands in the pine forest, and he looks up and sees 25 feet or
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