Growth Plates and Growth Rings: The Big Back Yard

I’m not a woods guy. My brain and spirit seek open spaces. My formative years near the ocean, on a lake, being a “flatlander” as woodsy Vermonters say, programmed my firmware for the marine world, for open vistas and for horizons.

When I’ve deer hunted, I’m sure I’ve missed many more deer than I’ve seen due to at least half of my CPU — to continue with the unwelcome computer metaphor–preoccupied with finding the way home again.

And I’ve been lost. There was one solo hunting venture when I realized the creek I had been following was flowing the wrong direction. I had a compass, but no map, and my assumption about the North-South lay of the land before I set out was inaccurate enough that the compass made no sense. Easy enough, I’d backtrack until I hit footprints. I found prints, which was at first a huge relief, but then I realized that there were many, many prints, some going in circles like the fresh tracks I was putting down. (Turned out the tracks were from the previous day’s rescue team for another hunter just as woods-direction-impaired as me.) And there were other times. As a kid of eight or nine, I once returned an hour or so late from a neighborhood game of “Chase” –which often veered into the scrubby forests around our house–one shoe missing, torn Toughskin jeans–tears and snot testifying to my fear of spending the rest of my life in the bracken. Another time, a buddy (who does NOT waste his CPU cycles when looking for deer; I swear he imagines them into existence) and I hiked through nasty brush behind his house. When we finally broke into a clearing near treeline, were momentarily defeated by other footprints. It took us a while to realize they were remarkably similar to our own.

I’ve done better in treeless spaces. There was the time on the Egegik River in the fog and darkness. I had taken the Fish and Game skiff down to the cannery on the bay to call my buddy to congratulate him on his wedding. The skiff was full of salmon, which we caught to test run strength, and which we would sell at the cannery. The cannery wasn’t buying and I had to wait in line for the payphone with 10 or 20 gillnetters as I watched the fog coming in across the bay. While I had the trip back up river to our field camp timed with the flooding tide and remaining daylight, fog spooked me into leaving early. I went aground. On a sandbar with fresh brown bear tracks. As the fog swallowed me and the salmon-heavy skiff, and daylight waned, I waited for enough water to float us, and putted ahead blindly to the next grounding. On one of those short trips, I heard the nesting gulls which marked the deepwater channel to get home. The rest of the trip was slow but sure. Run a couple of hundred yards (now in darkness), shut the engine down, listen for the gulls, re-orient, and head home.

Anyway, the forest behind our cul-de-sac has a trail, and it’s frequented by fellow-dog walkers, and other neighbors, young and old. It’s a good place to let Cedar off leash. I’m not sure how we’ll fare with the first bear or porky encounter. My other concern is that I gather pups aren’t supposed to make “long” “hikes” until their growth plates fully fuse. (According to the websites that suggest a 4 month old-pup shouldn’t hike or otherwise exercise for more than twenty minutes, we just overdid it .)

But much as I’m not a woods guy, there’s really no better place to be in Southeast Alaska in November than the old growth forest. I thought about that a few steps in, and the phrase “forest therapy” popped up in my brain. I guess that’s really a thing.

Inspired by the Japanese practice of shinrin-yoku, or “forest bathing,” forest therapy is a guided outdoor healing practice….[f]orest therapy relies on trained guides, who set a deliberately slow pace and invite people to experience the pleasures of nature through all of their senses…

Decades of research show that forest bathing may help reduce stress, improve attention, boost immunity, and lift mood.Trees give off volatile essential oils called phytoncides that have antimicrobial properties and may influence immunity. One Japanese study showed a rise in number and activity of immune cells called natural killer cells, which fight viruses and cancer, among people who spent three days and two nights in a forest versus people who took an urban trip. This benefit lasted for more than a month after the forest trip!

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Some research suggests exposure to natural tree oils helps lift depression, lowers blood pressure, and may also reduce anxiety. Tree oils also contain 3-carene. Studies in animals suggest this substance may help lessen inflammation, protect against infection, lower anxiety, and even enhance the quality of sleep.

“Can forest therapy enhance health and well-being?”, Harvard Health Publishing

Our big back yard, thousands of acres of forest extending back to the Juneau Ice Field and into Canada and the giant continental craton, ain’t a bad place to take a little “forest bath,” in part because the old growth canopy keeps the actual rain bath to a minimum, in part because it has a trail so I’ll live to type another day, but really because the old growth back there is awesome.

On our “big tree walks,” we skirt the fringes of suburbia. We pass a treehouse and various trinkets testifying to the spirit of the neighbors who choose this fringe. We splosh through mud patches, and over slick corduroy “bridges”. We walk through gates of time (time courtesy of time–some tree rings testifying to centuries; gates thanks to friend Kurt’s chain saw).

And here at home, snoring Cedar, maybe a bit drunk on tree oils, works to close those growth plates so we can go deeper into the big back yard soon.

Cedarpup: girl being made of trees (and kibble).