In our city, sidewalks can be battle zones. You can sit or lie on them — or not. You can also shit on them, as some dogs and people do, unfortunately.
So thank goodness for trees! Something for our sidewalks, parks, and yards that we can all get behind. Or under. (Unless you’re under this tree. More about one of its cousins in a moment.)
Our urban forest is a perfect swaying symbol for our civic pride, eco-aspirations, aesthetic self-regard, and debate over fiscal responsibility, which is why The Frisc will run occasional profiles of some of the city’s arborial all-stars. Here’s our first installment. If you’ve got a favorite, let us know (hello@thefrisc.com).
California Buckeye
The California buckeye is one of the few native San Franciscans — trees or people, for that matter — that you can find on our streets, which which is why it leads our series.
When a new development threatened this particular Aesculus californica specimen, now possibly more than 130 years old, and its companion bay laurel on the corner of North Willard and McAllister Streets near the University of San Francisco, people protested. According to the Chronicle, the developer made concessions to save the buckeye and laurel, even though they weren’t exactly on his property.
His construction would have damaged their roots, so he altered the design to spare them. The neighbors were NIMBYs, or perhaps YIYFYs — yes in your front yard — from another era. They made concessions, too, letting the developer shift the new building back from the sidewalk, even though it would block some of their north-facing views and daylight. “Everybody had to give up something to get to this point,” said one neighbor. “But it was a great solution.”
Ah, simpler times.
Dawn Redwood
It’s not every day that a creature once thought extinct is suddenly there in front of you, very much alive. In the East Bay, this could happen in a remote area of Mt. Diablo State Park. If you’re in a submersible beneath the surface of the Indian Ocean, you might bump into a coelacanth.
It can happen much more easily in San Francisco. Walk into Golden Gate Park just past the park headquarters and you’ll find Metasequoia glyptostroboides: The dawn redwood. It looks odd, and it is odd.
The species is a deciduous needle-leafed conifer. Most conifers, like California’s native redwoods and sequoias, are evergreens. But if the dawn redwood, a native of China, looks rusty, it’s because the needles are dying and dropping for the winter.
In the 1940s, living Metasequoia were discovered in a remote part of China. Golden Gate Park’s dawn redwoods are spawn of those ancestors.
Bunya Bunya
Let’s be clear that this is one of our favorites not because of its potential for mayhem. Our days of nihilist thrills are long over. No, we like the Bunya pine, Araucaria bidwilli, a native of Australian rainforests, because of its Seussian profile and absurd cone. Yes, one of those 16-pound cones nearly killed a visitor to Fort Mason, where a grove of bunyas live.
But we’re not holding a grudge, and neither are the owners of the house at the intersection of Vicente and Wawona (talk about Seussian!) near West Portal.
The bunya on their sidewalk seemed benign — that is, bereft of hazardous cones. It’s unclear if this was due to owner vigilance or just the natural cycle of things. Bunyas only produce cones every three years. The trees are sacred to native Australians and their edible seeds were at the center of Bunya feasts, according to the Gymnosperm Database.
A whiff of danger, delicious and exotic, and a bit kooky to behold: A description, perhaps, of San Francisco itself — or of how we like to think of ourselves.
Attempts to reach the West Portal bunya owners have so far been unsuccessful.
Barry Owen contributed to this dispatch.