Saving the Beauty of an Ancient Oak
Paul Melzer
Mission Advancement
The Wildlands Conservancy
Up the canyon creek that descends from the rocky face of Wilshire Peak above Oak Glen, beyond a series of abrupt and unscalable waterfalls, there lives a fellowship of ancient canyon oaks. Among these grows one tree, officially measured and recognized as the largest specimen of all oak species. The Champion Oak has survived alongside its relatives through fire and flood, earthquake and drought, for an estimated 1500 years, and describing its size in feet measured does nothing to portray the feeling of massiveness when you’re beneath it.
The Champion Oak in 2018. Photo by Brian Kelly.
Words fail to describe why trees so easily inspire us. All trees are precious: they cleanse the air, nourish the soil, provide shade and shelter, come in myriad and wonderful shapes and colors. Trees are generous and each one is a champion—but oaks, perhaps more than any other species of tree, represent for people some of life’s highest attributes. Strength, wisdom, perseverance, patience, loyalty, humble beginnings—these are hallmark traits we all seek in others and in ourselves, and we find all these reflected in oaks. There is a magic to old oak trees.
Experiencing Nature’s beauty demands a commitment to defend it when called to do so, and so when, over a 6-week period this summer two wildfires, the Apple Fire and El Dorado Fire, bore down on the community of Oak Glen, Wildlands staff set to work to protect the Oak Glen Preserve and as much as we could, the surrounding forests.
The Apple Fire burns toward Oak Glen Preserve in early August. Photo by John Trammell.
As the nation watched the Apple Fire scorch the southeastern slopes of the San Bernardino National Forest and San Gorgonio Wilderness, The Wildlands Conservancy considered how we could protect the Champion Oak; we were under voluntary evacuation orders, and the hundreds of firefighters were busy saving homes and property. How were we to convince them that efforts protecting a single tree would be worth sparing a hotshot crew to clear the tinder and limb-up around the tree and its neighbors?
By the morning of August 6 we felt it was our last chance to climb into the canyon and do our best to help it survive the fire. Frazier Haney, Wildlands’ Executive Director, met and spoke daily with the fire chiefs overseeing the Apple Fire response. Frazier was persistent, insisting that focus be kept on Oak Glen, its surrounding forest, and the creek that provided fresh water for the community. And he’d spoken previously requesting protection for the Champion Oak. Frazier left us to meet with Chief Blankenheim and was successful in his bid for help. Not one, but multiple crews from the Vallecito Conservation Camp were dispatched.
Wildlands staff guided twenty-four hotshot crew members and their three captains up and over the steep access trail. These were prison inmates serving their time battling fires. After the long slog up the steep side of the mountain and back down into the canyon, lugging chainsaws, fuel, and other equipment further up the canyon, they all arrived at the tree in good spirits and set to work assembling teams to get the needed work done.
The Apple Fire burns toward Oak Glen Preserve in early August. Photo by John Trammell.
The American poet Mary Oliver wrote that when we are among trees, “they give off such hints of gladness.” A spirit of hope pervaded the hotshot crew who had worked on the steep ground beneath the great oak—that was a long, strenuous day. Before starting back, many of them expressed their thanks for the opportunity. This had been an act of heroism in protecting a tree never to be forgotten. They rose to the occasion and did the hard work.
The Apple Fire burned some 33,000 acres of dry chaparral and forest wilderness, yet somehow stopped short of reaching the Champion Oak. One month later, the El Dorado Fire set on its destructive path, this time from the west. Within a few terrible days—and nights—it had consumed the mountain ridge and the entirety of the forest slopes looking down over Oak Glen. The canyons there are deep and we couldn’t tell if the Champion Oak had survived. Ten days had passed and we hiked back in, this time over a lunarscape of deep ash.
Cinders from the El Dorado Fire rest at the foot of the Champion Oak. Photo by Paul Melzer.
We turned the final corner in the creek bottom and saw a thankful sight: the Champion Oak had survived. Somehow, the fire had burned so close on the one side that the leaves were singed, but had not caught. On the other side of the tree, heading up the creek, more devastation and loss to many of the other ancient oaks and cedars in that steep grove. Scattered nearby were several smoldering logs and trunks, even ten days following the fire.
As we surveyed the area it was evident how all the hard work the members of that hotshot fire team had done one month prior—the clearing of adjacent shrubs, limbing-up the lower branches and moving aside the potential tinder near the tree—all this work really had helped save the tree’s life. Every member of that crew can know that their efforts made the difference.
The Vallecito Hotshots and the Champion Oak, August 2020. Photo by Paul Melzer.