Big Sur, California
Just outside Templeton between the north and south lanes of the 101 freeway, there’s a half-mile stretch of road where large oak trees grow in the median. One, in particular, a Valley Oak, is extremely large, its branches reaching out over the freeway as traffic rushes past at 70 mph. The sight of it always stops my mind and grips my heart as I pass. A California Valley Oak can live over 800 years.
Given the size and shape of this great tree, I would guess it’s many hundreds of years old, a mere sapling when the freeway was nothing more than a foot path. Highway 101 follows the historic El Camino Real, the route traveled by the missionaries through the inland valleys. Through all its different versions, from footpath to dirt road, two-lane blacktop to divided highway, the engineers saved this tree and the few others along this median.
Trees communicate via their root systems, reaching out to other trees, plants, and fungi in a mycorrhizal dance commonly called the Wood Wide Web, sharing nutrients and sending chemical signals. More recently, we’ve discovered that trees also communicate through airborne pheromones to warn their neighbors of an insect infestation, giving them time to strengthen their defenses. What distress does this Valley Oak communicate, this lone tree living on a strip of ground in the middle of the 101 freeway, a lord of trees, a regal great-grandparent many times over?