The "Grizzly Giant," in the lower grove, is 94 feet in
circumference and 31 feet in diameter; it has been decreased by
burning. Indeed, the forests at times present a somewhat unattractive
appearance, as, in the past, the Indians, to help them in their
hunting, burned off the chaparral and rubbish, and thus disfigured
many of these splendid trees by burning off nearly all the bark. The
first branch of the "Grizzly Giant" is nearly two hundred feet from
the ground and is six feet in diameter. The remains of a tree, now
prostrate, indicate that it had reached a diameter of about forty feet
and a height of 400 feet; the trunk is hollow and will admit of the
passage of three horsemen riding abreast. There are about 125 trees of
over forty feet in circumference. Besides these two main groves there
are the Tolumne grove, with thirty big trees; the Fresno grove, with
over eight hundred spread over an area of two and a half miles long
and one to two broad; and the Stanislaus grove, the Calaveras group,
with from 700 to 800. There should be named in this connection the
petrified forest near Calitoga, which contains portions of nearly one
hundred distinct trees of great size, scattered over a tract of three
or four miles in extent: the largest of this forest is eleven feet in
diameter at the base and sixty feet long. It is conjectured that these
prostrate giants were silicified by the eruption of the neighboring
Mount St. Helena, which discharged hot alkaline waters containing
silica in solution.
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