Empty thrones: somewhere out there royalty is just waiting to be recognized. Long live the king--wherever it is.

They are out there. Some may live their entire lives without ever being seen by human eyes. Others may live among us, seen by thousands yet unrecognized, like royalty dressed as paupers. They are the biggest trees of their kind but they cannot lay claim to their rightful throne until someone discovers, measures, and nominates them.

Most of these true kings and queens of the forest are represented by lesser nobility, or even the occasional servant of the court who spends a few surreptitious and gleeful moments on the throne. The National Register of Big Trees lists the biggest known trees and can rarely claim absolute knowledge of the absolute ruler of a given species. We honor these surrogates, just as we honor Olympian gold medalists in spite of the probability that there are faster and stronger people somewhere in the world whose potential remains hidden. But the current Register lists 94 species for which the throne is completely empty. No king. No queen. Not even a naughty page.

Of course, before 1940, when AMERICAN FORESTS initiated the Big Tree Program, all thrones were empty. For the first several decades it was essentially left to nominators to choose which trees needed a champion. Most were native or naturalized species but quite a few ornamentals and hybrids were crowned. In 1980, after adopting Elbert Little Jr.'s Checklist of United States Trees as the authority for which species to include, AMERICAN FORESTS began to print a list of Species Without Champs in each installment of the Register. Over the next 20 years, nominators reduced the number of empty thrones by an average of eight per year, from 257 in 1980, to 93 in 2000. During that period, each successive Register saw a reduction in crownless species with highs of 28 found in 1984, 36 in 1994, and 44 in 2000.

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But in 2002, for the first time in Register history, we gained empty thrones and shot up to 99. The 2004 Register established an all-time low of 85, but this year we're back up to 94. Actually, 12 empty thrones in 2004 were filled in 2006, but another 24 species were dethroned and left without a successor.

Upon closer examination, 94 empty thrones isn't that bad. Twenty-four of these were occupied in 2004 but those champs have since either died (17), couldn't be found (2), had been misidentified (2), or were too small to be a tree (3). Crucially, none had potential successors waiting in the files of AMERICAN FORESTS for their chance at glory. Until the current Register came out (the one you are holding), big tree hunters didn't know to look for a replacement. So a small number of temporarily empty thrones are to be expected.

With two years between published Registers, you might also expect the more unfamiliar or rare species to stay on the empty thrones list for a few rounds before a tree is nominated. Of the 94 empty thrones, 37 were once occupied. Most had a crowned tree within the last decade but a royal Pensacola hawthorn was last recognized in 1982. The last Fallax pinyon pines king finished its reign in 1978; the guava's throne has been empty since 1971.

Another nine empty thrones were formerly filled but not with true monarchs. The species they represented--like American snowbell, Georgia holly, and Florida crossopetalum--infrequently attain the stature of trees. In the 1990s the philosophy at AMERICAN FORESTS was that any specimen, no matter how small, could be the champion if was the biggest one reported at that time. Later, after a number of twiggy things were crowned, it was decided that a specimen should meet accepted standards for being a tree--at least 9.5 inches in circumference and 13 feet tall. After all, this is not the National Register of Big Trees and Shrubs.

This means that, out of 94 currently empty thrones, 57 species have never had a true champion, and 48 have never even had a nominee. Out of a possible 826 species and varieties in the Register, that's not too bad. But the goal has always been to have a full roster of big trees so here is some information to help you find a lost champion, and get yourself in the record books.

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Let's start with the easy ones. These are the thrones of recently dead or disqualified trees that had no backup wannabes. Sometimes quite a few thrones are vacated because of a concentrated effort by state big tree coordinators to relocate their state's champs. They often find that some champs have died, some have lost points due to damage, or some have been mismeasured or misidentified.

Empty thrones in 2006 include only a few familiar species like sweet crabapple, turkey oak, northern pin oak, and sweetgum. You are welcome to nominate a tree to replace them, but keep in mind the former champs scored 116, 218, 335, and 431 points, respectively. Other recently vacated thrones, with the previous champ's point totals: cajeput-tree (300), castorbean (49), Allegheny chinkapin (155), Ozark chinkapin (124), littleleaf cyrilla (61), September elm (271), Lindheimer hackberry (127), scrub hickory (121), screwbean mesquite (84), and water-elm (313). Your tree doesn't have to beat those numbers but, unless it's the only nominee, it must be close to have a chance at royal fame.

The next category of empty thrones are species that may or may not be common; the trick is to find a specimen that is actually a tree. According to my field guides, these species rarely grow taller than 15 or 20 feet, but that's tall enough to be a champion. It is tempting, and allowed, to fill a throne with the first tree-sized specimen you happen upon. But as the Chinese philosopher Mencius said, "To give the throne to another man would be easy; to find a man who shall benefit the kingdom is difficult."

Tree species that are usually shrubs are scattered across the country. Hunt for tree-sized laurel sumac, lemonade sumac, or greenbark ceanothus in the chaparral of coastal southern California. The littleleaf sumac grows on dry slopes and plains from southeastern Arizona to central Texas. In south Texas, look for Texas forestiera. Any Geyer willow in western mountains, or any silky willow in the East, is a potential champ if more than 15 feet tall. Actually, most of the nine willows without champions are shrubs more often than trees; you'd be lucky to find specimens of any taller than 30 feet. Some Florida species reach just above tree size, some with telltale names like bitterbush and maidenbrush.

Many champion trees are discovered casually by people who happen to know a big whatever-it-is when they see it. But others, like quite a few with empty thrones, require a special and targeted effort to find because their species is very rare, isolated, or found only in a small part of the country. The range of the seaside alder includes Oklahoma, Maryland, Delaware, and Georgia, but it occupies only a few small areas in those states and is found nowhere in between. The last champion Kenai birch grew 47 feet tall, but to fill its vacated throne you'll have to search in Alaska. The rare and critically imperiled Kelsey locust, a small relative of black locust with narrow leaves and pink flowers, grows in the wild only in the western mountains of North Carolina.

California is touted as one of the floristic hotspots of the world with more than 1,400 plant species, including at least 25 trees, found nowhere else in the world. The distinctive bristlecone fir, easily recognized by its very narrow spirelike crown, is restricted to the Santa Lucia Mountains south of Monterey. Try looking in the Cone Peak area, but keep in mind the former champ was more than 4 feet thick and 182 feet tall. To find the first-ever champion feltleaf ceanothus, take a boat out to Santa Cruz or Santa Catalina Island. Go in February when they stand out in their coat of pale blue flowers. Other Channel Island endemic species will be added to the Register soon (see page 10). North of the border, extreme southern California is also the only place to find the first national champion desert apricot and Mexican fremontia. However, a nomination for the latter species is best left to botanists and conservationists, since the U.S. population has declined to fewer than 100 individuals.

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Florida also has a large number of species found nowhere else in the U.S. In fact, the Sunshine State is the only place to look for about one-third of the species without a champion. Half of those are found only in the southern counties of Collier, Dade, and Monroe. The trick, and joy, is to learn how to identify subtropical trees. Would you know a cocoplum, graytwig, guiana-plum, seven-year-apple, long-stalk stopper, or balsam torchwood if you saw one?

This leads us to our last category of empty throne species, the ones which are hard to identify. In a few cases, the problem lies in a lack of easily available information. The Fallax pinyon pine, listed in the Register as Pinus edulis var. fallax, a variety of two-leaf pinyon pine, has not had a champion since a 98-point tree wore the crown in 1978. It's not even mentioned in my field guides. But with some Internet sleuthing I found out that it is now treated as a variety of singleleaf pinyon pine (Pinus monophyla), and that it is primarily found in Arizona, although its range spills over a bit into each of the neighboring states. If you stay away from extreme western and northwestern Arizona, any big singleleaf pinyon pine you find in that state should be eligible to wear the Fallax pinyon pine crown.

Nine of the empty thrones are willows: balsam, basket, dusky, geyer, littletree, northwest, river, satiny, and silky. Only the balsam (28 points), dusky (87), and silky (97) have had former champions. Willows are usually found along streams and lakes, although they form upland thickets in the mountains and subarctic regions. They are readily identified as a group but the species sometimes fall into that field guide category of "notoriously difficult to distinguish." To do better than "Salix sp." you may need a good hand lens--or an expert botanist.

If willow identification gives you a headache, you can either chew the bark (the original source of aspirin) or just be grateful you are not trying to identify a hawthorn. In North America, these are the most notorious of all trees. If field guides were like old maps, hawthorns would be placed near the edge with the warning: Here there be monsters!

You know you're in trouble when the number of species recognized by different authorities varies from 35 to over 1000! Even George Petrides, author of the Peterson Field Guides to eastern and western trees, throws up his hands and includes only four species. The implication is if your tree isn't one of those four, surrender at 'Crataegus sp.' Unless you're a skilled botanist, you'll probably have to find one to identify and nominate a barberry, beautiful, Pensacola, Brainerd, Gregg, Harbison, Reverchon, threeflower, or (yikes!) willow hawthorn. For all but the first three, you'd be the first to fill their throne.

Fortunately, most of the empty thrones are not hawthorns. And with a concentrated effort, we can reduce the Species Without Champs list to just the recent dethronees that lack an immediate successor.

In J. R. R. Tolkein's Middle Earth, the people of Gondor waited a thousand years for the return of the king. The people of AMERICAN FORESTS await the return of 91 kings. But with your help, it won't be long until "the crownless again shall be king."

Whit Bronaugh writes from Eugene, Oregon.

Story and photos by Whit Bronaugh

RELATED ARTICLE: SPECIES WITHOUT A CHAMP

HELP US FIND CHAMPS FOR THESE

There are 94 trees included on AMERICAN FORESTS' National Register of Big Trees that do not currently have a champion rooted to the throne. Grab your tree ID book, this list, and maybe your favorite botanist and start hunting! Species with a * after their names have never had a champion. Look in the parentheses for a list of states in which the species can be found. A # indicates a naturalized species.

Species           Common Name    Scientific Name

ALDER             Seaside        Alnus maritima (OK, MD, DE, GA)
ANISE-TREE        Yellow         Illicium parviflorum * (FL)
APPLE             Sweet Crab     Malus coronaria (NY, IN, MO, KS, TN,
                                   AL, GA, SC, NC)
APRICOT           Desert         Prunus fremontii * (CA)
ARAUCARIA         Cunningham     Araucaria cunninghamii (HI)
BAYBERRY          Evergreen      Myrica heterophylla * (NJ, PA, DE)
BIRCH             Kenai          Betula papyrifera var. kenaica (AK)
BITTERBUSH                       Picramnia pentandra * (FL)
BURNINGBUSH       Western        Euonymus occidentalis * (WA, OR)
CAJEPUT-TREE                     Melaleuca quinquenervia # (FL)
CAMPHOR-TREE                     Cinnamomum camphora # (FL)
CAPER             Limber         Capparis flexuosa * (FL)
CASTORBEAN                       Ricinus communis (FL)
CEANOTHUS         Feltleaf       Ceanothus arboreus * (CA)
CEANOTHUS         Greenbark      Ceanothus spinosus * (CA)
CHINKAPIN         Allegheny      Castanea pumila (NJ, PA)
CHINKAPIN         Ozark          Castanea ozarkensis (MO, AR, OK)
COCOPLUM                         Chrysobalanus icaco * (FL)
COLUBRINA         Coffee         Colubrina arborescens * (FL)
COLUBRINA         Cuba           Colubrina cubensis * (FL)
CROSSOPETALUM     Florida        Crossopetalum rhacoma * (FL)
CYRILLA           Littleleaf     Cyrilla racemiflora var. parvifolia
                                   (GA, FL)
DOWNY-MYRTLE                     Rhodomyrtus tomentosa # * (FL)
ELDER             Velvet         Sambucus velutina (CA, NV, AZ)
ELM               September      Ulmus serotina (KY, IL, TN, AL, GA, AR,
                                   OK)
FLORIDA-PRIVET                   Forestiera segregata (FL)
FIDDLEWOOD        Berlandier     Citharexylum berlandieri * (TX)
FIR               Bristlecone    Abies bracteata (CO, ID, OR., CA)
FORESTIERA        Texas          Forestiera angustifolia * (TX)
FREMONTIA         Mexican        Fremontodendron mexicanum * (CA)
GRAYTWIG                         Schoepfia chrysophylloides (FL)
GUAVA                            Psidium guajava # (FL, CA)
GUIANA-PLUM                      Drypetes lateriflora (FL)
HACKBERRY         Lindheimer     Celtis lindheimeri (TX)
HAWTHORN          Barberry       Crataegus berberifolia * (IL, KS, TX,
                                   MS, KY, MO, LA, AR)
HAWTHORN          Beautiful      Crataegus pulcherrima (FL)
HAWTHORN          Brainerd       Crataegus brainerdii * (MI, OH, PA)
HAWTHORN          Gregg          Crataegus greggiana * (TX)
HAWTHORN          Harbison       Crataegus harbisonii * (TN, AL, MS)
HAWTHORN          Pensicola      Crataegus lacrimata (FL)
HAWTHORN          Reverchon      Crataegus reverchonii * (MO, KS)
HAWTHORN          Threeflower    Crataegus triflora * (GA, AL, MS)
HAWTHORN          Willow         Crataegus saligna * (CO)
HICKORY           Scrub          Carya floridana (FL)
HOLLY             Dune           Ilex opaca var. arenicola * (FL)
HOLLY             Georgia        Ilex longpipes * (SC, GA, LA)
HOLLY             Sarvis         Ilex amelanchier * (NC, SC, GA, FL, LA)
HOLLY             Tawnberry      Ilex krugiana (FL)
LICARIA           Florida        Licaria triandra * (FL)
LOCUST            Kelsey         Robinia kelseyi * (NC, TN, KY)
MAIDENBRUSH                      Savia bahamensis * (FL)
MAIDENBRUSH       Marlberry      Ardisia escallonioides * (FL)
MESQUITE          Screwbean      Prosopis pubescens (TX, NM, AZ, UT, NV,
                                   CA)
NECTANDRA         Florida        Nectandra coriacea * (FL)
OAK               McDonald       Quercus macdonaldii * (CA)
OAK               Northern pin   Quercus ellipsoidalis (MI, WI, MN)
OAK               Turkey         Quercus laevis (VA, NC, SC, GA, FL, AL,
                                   MS LA)
PAWPAW            Bigflower      Asimina obovata * (NC, SC, GA, FL)
PEPPERTREE        Brazil         Schinus terebinthifolia # (TX, CA)
PINE              Fallax pinyon  Pinus edulis var. fallax (CO, UT)
PLUM              Canada         Prunus nigra (MI, MN, IA, IL, IN, OH,
                                   WV, CT, RI, MA, VT, NH, ME)
PRICKLY-ASH       Biscayne       Zanthoxylum coriaceum * (FL)
PRICKLY-PEAR      Brazil         Opuntia brasiliensis # * (FL)
PRIVET            Chinese        Ligustrum sinense # (NC, LA)
SAPIUM            Jumping-bean   Sapium biloculare * (AZ CA)
SEVEN-YEAR-APPLE                 Genipa clusiifolia (FL)
SNOWBELL          American       Styrax americanus * (VA, NC, SC, GA)
SNOWBELL          Bigleaf        Styrax grandifolius * (VA, FL, TX, KY)
SNOWBELL          Sycamore-leaf  Styrax platanifolius * (TX)
STOPPER           Long-stalk     Psidium longipes * (FL)
STOPPER           Twinberry      Myrcianthes fragrans var. fragrans *
                                   (FL)
SUGAR-APPLE                      Annona squamosa # * (FL.)
SUMAC             Kearney        Rhus kearneyi * (CA)
SUMAC             Laurel         Rhus laurina * (CA)
SUMAC             Lemonade       Rhus integrifolia * (CA)
SUMAC             Littleleaf     Rhus microphylla * (TX, OK, NM, AZ)
SWEETGUM                         Liquidambar styraciflua # (NJ, MD, DE,
                                   PA, VA, OH, IL, AK, TX, FL, WV)
TAMARISK          Small-flower   Tamarix paryiflora # (CA)
TORCHWOOD         Balsam         Amyris balsamifera * (FL)
TREE TOBACCO                     Nicotiana glauca (FL, TX, NM, AZ, CA)
TREMA             West Indies    Trema lamarckiana * (FL)
VAUQUELINIA       Fewflower      Vauquelinia pauciflora * (AZ)
WATER-ELM                        Planera aquatica (NC, SC, FL, GA, AL,
                                   MS, LA, TX, OK, MO, IL, KY, TN)
WHITE-MANGROVE                   Laguncularia racemosa (FL)
WILLOW            Balsam         Salix pyrifolia (MN, WI, MI, NY, ME)
WILLOW            Basket         Salix viminalis * (MS, ME, CT, RI, VT))
WILLOW            Dusky          Salix melanopsis (WA, OR, UT, CA, WY)
WILLOW            Geyer          Salix geyerana * (MT, AZ, CO, WY)
WILLOW            Littletree     Salix arbxsusculoides * (AK)
WILLOW            Northwest      Salix sessilifolia * (WA, OR)
WILLOW            River          Salix fluviatilis * (ME, MN., SD, KS,
                                   VA)
WILLOW            Satiny         Salix pellita * (MN, WI, MI, NY, ME,
                                   VT, NH)
WILLOW            Silky          Salix sericea (AK, WA, OR, CA, ID, MT)
WINTERBERRY       Smooth         Ilex laevigata * (NY, ME, SC)