Lighthouse Tree tops list of Norwalk Notables

A sycamore on Soundview Avenue called the Lighthouse Tree—once a beacon for sailors and the legendary site of a cache of arms for soldiers in the Revolutionary War—is among the Notable Trees being catalogued by a team from the Norwalk Tree Alliance. Dan Landau, the vice president of the alliance, and Jeanne McAndrew, the treasurer, have identified at least a dozen remarkable trees and they intend to document other extraordinary specimens as they screen Norwalk’s urban forest. Both have been volunteers with the NTA for five years and describe the appeal of the association in virtually the same terms--an affinity for the outdoors, the wonders of nature and an opportunity for give-something-back community service.

Like the historic tree at curbside on Sound Avenue, there are an estimated 20,000 trees on civic property in Norwalk and manifoldly more, perhaps as many as 100,000, on private property.
A computer-based instrument dubbed the TreeScout, under development by NTA’s president, physicist Dave Tracy, is ultimately to be used to conduct a full arboreal inventory.
In the interim, Landau and McAndrew are scouring the city for more exceptional trees, outfitted with a tape measure and an apparatus known as an inclinometer, based on tilt sensor technology that measures tree height using geometry. They have so far evaluated 70 of 90 trees nominated to the Norwalk Notable Tree Registry since 2002. On the list are 36 different species and several exceptional trees in each of the species.
What kind of trees are considered Notables? They might be uncommon because of advanced age or lofty height, resplendence and symmetry, rarity of the species, multiple trunks and unusual shape or historic heritage. Householders generally provide the leads for Landau and McAndrew. If there is a tree on your property that you feel might qualify as notable, you can reach McAndrew online at bjmca20@sbcglobal.net .

Lightning has sheared off the top of the Lighthouse Tree and today it stands diminished at 77 feet high. But it was reportedly once a towering point visible from Long Island Sound and served as a structural landmark for shipping. At night, a flagman supposedly climbed the tree and guided ships into Norwalk Harbor with a lantern.
Folklore has it that in the Revolutionary War soldiers hid their guns by burying the weapons at the base of the tree and covering the cache with a large rock that is still there today, virtually engulfed now by the growth of the trunk.

Among the other Notable Trees on the Norwalk list:

• An American beech on the grounds of the 1880 Selleck House on Berkley Street.
• A catalpa with a cantilevered limb on Perry Avenue.
• A black oak with four trunks on Highland Avenue.
• A weeping beech with multiple trunks in Cranbury Park, the site of the third annual Norwalk Tree Festival next May.
• A European beech on Bottswood Road, believed to have survived after the British burned Norwalk in 1779.

In a special category is a sourwood tree in Riverside Cemetery that qualifies as a state champion for its age and elegance, Norwalk’s only such designate. A complete listing of the specimens in the Norwalk Notable Tree Registry is available at the NTA Web site online at http://www.norwalktreealliance.org/ .

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