Puget Sound Native Tree
Botanical Garden
People have created across the United States lists of the largest individual tree of many species as well as typical size of each in a mature forest. They call the largest tree a CHAMPION TREE, for bragging rights.
Grand Fir
Typical dimensions of a large tree of this species in a mature forest:
Height:
Diameter:
Age:
Champion tree for this species:
Height:
Diameter:
Age:
230 feet
6 feet
150 years
300'
7 ft
350 years
4- The Grand Fir is one of the four major tree in the local Bainbridge forests.
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Grand Fir
abies grandis
Grand fir (*Abies grandis) is a large, fragrant evergreen conifer native to the Pacific Northwest, known for its graceful pyramidal shape, glossy dark green needles with white undersides, and strong citrusy-pine scent, making it a popular Christmas tree and valuable for wildlife habitat, though its wood isn't top-tier for lumber. These majestic trees can grow exceptionally tall (over 200 feet) and are easily recognized by their flat, two-ranked needles and upright cones that disintegrate on the tree.
Grand Fir
This tree species was growing at the Dolphin Place location when the property was purchased in 1973.
Exact data was not collected at the time. The following is data recorded in 2020.
Largest tree for this species within Dolphin Place Open Space:
Height:
Diameter:
90 ft topped
30 inches
Grand fir cones are distinctive: they grow upright on the top branches, are cylindrical (2-4 inches long, green to yellowish-brown), and unlike pines, they disintegrate on the tree in fall, leaving only a central spike, so you won't find whole cones on the ground, just scattered scales.
Grand fir bark starts smooth and grayish-green with resin blisters when young, but matures into a thicker, gray-brown, mottled bark with flat, vertical ridges and narrow furrows, revealing reddish tones in the fissures but generally staying smoother and less deeply grooved than Douglas fir, resembling Western Hemlock's bark. At Dolphin Place the bark of the Grand Fir hosts a yellowish powder lichen while the hemlock powder lichen is avocado green (if you can't see the needles).
Grand fir needles are flat, shiny dark green on top with two distinct white stripes (stomata) underneath, about 1 to 2.5 inches long, and notched or blunt at the tip, arranged in flattened, two-ranked rows on the twig, giving branches a flat, layered look with a strong, pleasant fragrance when crushed.