Highest Point in Carbon County PA. Climb #33 of 67 trees on 67 mountains in 67 counties.

Climb #33
Carbon County
41.043777, -75.60519
Jan 14, 2024
Elev’ 2179’
Black Spruce! Native Black Spruce!
I’ve seen a lot of forests and a lot of trees but on highest point in Carbon County PA I found something pretty special; a stand of native Black Spruce trees. During the last period of glacial expanse (which ended about 12,00 years ago) Pennsylvania resembled Northern Canada and Alaska of today. The Tundra was shifting north and trees began to move in. One of these was Black Spruce. As the climate continued to warm, these boreal species began to lose out to Oaks, White Pine, and other trees we consider to be common in Pennsylvania today. However, there are still a few places where these sub-arctic species hang on. The very top of the mountain in Carbon county is one of these places. I’ve seen a handful of others. One of my favorites is Tamarack Swamp between Renovo and Crossfork. These high elevations still present environmental conditions that favor species such as the Black Birch. In forestry we refer to these as “relict species”. As the climate warms due to human caused greenhouse gasses, I will likely live to see these species eventually disappear from Pennsylvania. Their margin of survival is already incredibly slim. This was an incredibly challenging hike to the high point. I was joined by Rudy Kristjanson-Gural. We followed a very rustic trail through the game lands through a jungle of mountain laurel and rhododendron until we came to a wall of boulders. As we scaled the boulderfield it occurred to me that we were very likely going over active bear dens. At one point I remember thinking I was so exhausted that if a mother bear came out to challenge me, I’d let her win. At the top of the summit it was like an entirely different biome. We found 8-10” of hard snowpack and Black Spruce everywhere. At the high point I picked a White Pine tree. In hindsight, there was a Black Spruce that was a bit taller but I was simply exhausted and the White Pine had easy ladder-like branches that required no rope so I climbed that. The wind was ripping with 40 mph gusts and temps were well below freezing. We chose a slightly longer route down from the mountain that followed a power line. On the way back Rudy suggested I climb the state tree for every state in the USA. We’ll see. Not today! We got back to our vehicle just before dark. If Rudy had not been along for the adventure, I’m not sure that I would have followed through and completed this climb.

[@franciss.3298]

That would be an extreme adventure to complete climbing every state tree in every state but I'm sure even though you probably would be broke when you were done I'm sure you would be happy.