B3C lauds live oaks as community's original sentinels

In a year-long quest to find, measure and record the Beaufort area's largest and oldest live oaks, a team of arborists has located trees that might predate the city's origins and at least one that might be even larger than Charleston County's famed Angel Oak.

The project started as part of the Beaufort Three-Century Project's commemoration of the city's tricentennial. The goal: Find at least one tree more than 300 years old that could have been there when the city was chartered in 1711.

So far, the team has measured 136 live oaks with an average diameter of 6 feet and plan to keep going, Murphy said.

Read more: http://www.islandpacket.com/2010/04/30/1225462/three-century-beaufort-la...

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