Friendship Hill National Historic Site

[edfrank]

Hello ENTS,

I made a quick trip to Friendship Hill a couple of weeks ago. This is a 675 acre site in SW Fayette County along the east side of the Monongahela River. It is the former home of Albert Gallatin an early American statesmen. The entrance to the site is along Route 166 a few miles south of Masontown PA. The entrance is surrounded by old 100+ hardwoods, the house is set back about 1/2 mile from the entrance. The approach to the house is a very scenic tree-lined drive, that traverses a open field below the house which is situated on a small rise on the left.

I parked at a small parking area to the right of the main road about 300 yards into the site. The snow was still very deep, maybe 20", so I had to limit my explorations to the 'old growth' area southeast of the house. Fortunately it is only a couple hundred yards from where I parked. I first checked a nice N Red Oak that I had spotted on a previous visit to the site last fall. I measured 117'h x 15'-7"cbh for this tree. Further down into the old growth area I found many great trees. The tulip poplars were the tallest (no surprise). I'm new to tree measuring and this was only my second trip out with my Nikon 550 range finder.  So it was very exciting when I started getting readings in excess of 120'.  I found some very nice american beech, black and white oaks too. Really neat to be in an area where every tree is over 100' tall. It was very frustrating trying to get heights on the beech trees. The deep snow hampered my movements, and the crowns proved to dense to penetrate. The best reading I got for them was 97'. But they're probably 10 or 15' taller.

After and hour or two I hiked back to the road and walked to the park entrance, there are nice trees here too, maybe not quite as ancient.  Returning to the  parking area I measured a nice open-grown old white oak 106'h 14' 6"cbh. When the trails are clear of snow you can hike around the perimeter of the park in about an hour. The trees in the north and west areas are younger but very nice too. I hiked through these sections last fall, In addition to tulip trees and red oak, there are white pine, hemlock and scarlet oak and other oaks. Along the river there are a lot of paw-paw trees. The first I've seen in Pennsylvania. This is a great site and certainly warrants a return trip.

Some of the trees

Tulip Poplar
133.5' x 10.9'
128.5' x 10.6'
125.0' x 10.6'

N. Red Oak
117.0' x 15.6'

E. Hemlock
113.5' x 5.75'

White Pine
112.5' x 7.2'

White Oak
106.0' x 14.5'
105.0' x 10.9'

Black Oak
105.0' x 9.5'

A. Beech
97.0'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friendship_Hill

[edfrank]

Hello,

An excellent post about a site I have been wanting to visit.  I still want to get down there sometime this spring or summer.  Here is some informatio on the site from the Fayette County Natural Heritage Inventory:

Friendship Hill Slopes BDA  

               

                       

                                               

freindshiphill.JPG (44.48 KiB) Viewed 736 times

               

               

       
The National Park Service owns and manages the Friendship Hill National Historic Site. The land here has been in agriculture since the late 1700’s and has had some areas preserved, such as Sophie’s Woods, named for Albert Gallatin’s first wife Sophia, who is buried there. Sophie’s Woods is a mature Red Oak-mixed hardwood forest (NC001) that has taken on many old growth characteristics. Forests of such maturity are unusual for the county and the region in general. Dominants include red oak (Quercus rubra), white oak (Q. alba), scarlet oak (Q. coccinea), tuliptree (Liriodendron tulipifera), and shagbark hickory (Carya ovata). Major shrubs include mountain laurel (Kalmia latifolia), spicebush (Lindera benzoin), and American witchazel (Hamamelis virginiana). Herbs in this forest are sparse mainly composed of Virginia creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia), round-leaved violet (Viola rotundifolia), false solomon’s seal (Smilacina racemosa) and sessile bellflower (Uvularia sessilifolia). Excepting the conspicuous absence of American chestnut (Castanea dentata), this forest is probably similar to those forests seen by Albert Gallatin when he lived here and George Washington when he surveyed in the area.

               

                       

                                       

               

Here is a link to the NPS site:  http://www.nps.gov/frhi/index.htm

http://www.nrs.fs.fed.us/pubs/gtr/gtr_ne148%20papers/18downs-gtr148.pdf

COMPOSITION AND STRUCTURE OF AN OLD-GROWTH VVERSUS
A SECOND-GROWTH. WHITE OAK FOREST IN S0UTHWESTERN PENNSYLVANIA
Julie A* Downs md Marc D. Abmms'

Abstract: A relatively undisturbed old-growth, Quercus alba remnant and a second-gowth example of the forest type were suveyed in 1988-89 to ixgvestigate the successional status d Q. abba in the region. ...The oldest and largest trees in both stands were Q. alba with ages of 310 years and 148 yearsin the old-growth and second-growth stand, respectively.

The 3 ha old-growth forest, known as Sophia's Woods, is located within the 270 ha Friendship Hill National Historic Site in Fayette County, in southwestern Pennsylvania. Friendship Hill preserves the country estate of Albert Gallitin, the United States Secretary of Treasury under Presidents Jefferson and Madison. Gallitin purchased this bnd in 1786 when it was virgin timber. At that time, Gallitin girdled and removed some of the forest for agricultural purposes. By 1880, after Gallitin had sold the estate, 90 ha were cleared for pasture and food crops, while 180 ha were left in mature timber. By 1895, only 80 ha remained wooded.

A 1923 timber cruise of Friendship Hill reported that mature forests on the property were predominantly oaks "of the various species" with ages up to 260 years, and that some trees were of "unusual size" (e.g., the diameter of one white oak was 152 cm). It was also noted that Carya (hickory) and Quercus coccinea (Muench.) (scarlet oak) were "dying". This report recommended harvesting, but major timber operations were held off until the 1940's and lasted intermittently through- the 1950's. Between the 1930's and 1950's the amount of non-forest area within the property had more than doubled.  Physical evidence within Sophia's Woods and growth patterns of the existing trees indicated that this area was selectively cut in ,the 1930's and 1940's.

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[sjhalow]

Great information about the park. Much better than what's available from the wiki link that I included. I wonder if those scarlet oaks were truly dying when they were harvested. I imagine the 'there dying' excuse is still used by some folks to do this day. Let me know when you plan on visiting Friendship Hill. Maybe I can meet you at the park.