Cape Cod's Beech Forest To Join Old Growth Forest Network

PROVINCETOWN, MA — The Beech Forest at Cape Cod National Seashore will be officially inducted into the Old Growth Forest Network on Friday.

Though the forest is already protected as part of the National Park, its addition to the Old Growth Forest Network now connects it to "the only national network in the U.S. of protected, old-growth, native forests where people of all generations can experience biodiversity and the beauty of nature," officials with that organization say on its website.

The Beech Forest, located in Provincetown, offers a glimpse of the original arboreal landscape of Cape Cod. When the Mayflower landed in the early seventeenth century, much of the Cape was covered in pine-oak forests and groves of hickory, red maple, birch and beech trees. Over the next two hundred years, settlers cleared nearly all of these forests, NPS officials said.

Due to the Beech Forest’s low-lying position, it was spared from logging, making it the sole remnant of beech forest on the Cape.

“The Beech Forest has long inspired many generations, including the late poet Mary Oliver,” said Cape Cod National Seashore Superintendent Brian Carlstrom. “The trail is a wonderful sanctuary for those who seek to immerse themselves in nature and take in the sights, sounds and smells of a forest which has been left uninterrupted for hundreds of years. We are thankful for this recognition from the Old-Growth Forest Network.”

An induction celebration is scheduled for Friday at 11 a.m. at the Beech Forest Trailhead, which will be followed by a short trail walk with a plant ecologist.