Night of Largest Creatures

The constellation Cygnus reaches high in the sky of Sequoia National Park, while the TWAN photographer enjoys a night-time adventure among some of the largest trees of the planet. The area is most famous for its Giant Sequoia trees, including The General Grant tree as photographed in this image. It is over 80 meters high and the second largest tree in the world (in volume size). Through the 20th century the tree is named as the Nation’s Christmas Tree and a National Shrine for those who died in the Second World War.

Sequoias grow to an average height of 50-85 m and 6-8 m in diameter. Record trees have been measured to be about 95 m (311 ft) in height and 17 m (57 ft) in diameter. The oldest known Giant Sequoia is 3500 years old and many of the largest are over 2000 years old. The famous North America Nebula in Cygnus, visible as a red patch toward the top left of the illuminated sequoia, is about 2200 light years away. The light we are seeing from it today belongs to the time when some of these giant trees starts to grow.