The Lake Where You Live

Fall isn’t complete until the tamaracks turn. Driving Highway 47 south toward Rhinelander I pass stands of them growing in marshy areas — tamaracks like having their feet wet. When their needles display what naturalist Aldo Leopold aptly labeled smoky gold, they add one last splash of brilliance to the autumn landscape.

Do you have tamaracks on your lake?

As I write this on October 23, the ones on Birch Lake are well on the way to their peak color. Usually they don’t fully turn until the leaves on the maples, oaks, birches and aspens have come down. 

The Birch Lake tamaracks grow along a stretch of state-owned wetland north of the inlet creek. Their golden shapes provide, at least for a short spell, a striking counterpoint to the pines and hemlocks on the higher ground behind them.

Tamaracks are known as a pioneer species. That is, after an area with wet soils is disturbed, they are among the first to take root and grow. When mature they can reach heights up to 60 feet. Their root systems are shallow, and they thrive best in sunny, open areas. The ones on Birch Lake get constant direct sunlight, especially from the west.

Tamaracks are the only coniferous trees in this region that drop their needles for winter. Other evergreens lose needles, too — just not all at once. They shed and replace a percentage each year; in fall brown clusters of white pine needles carpet our lakefront stairs. 

Tamaracks discard all their needles every year, and so along with broadleaf trees they are classified as deciduous. The soft, wispy needles grow in bunches of 15 to 20, sparsely placed along the branches. In that configuration they shade each other less than other conifers’ needles do, That means during spring and summer they can take great advantage of the sun, make more food by photosynthesis, and build an energy supply for winter. 

Another attribute of tamaracks is that they use nitrogen with great efficiency. In fall they pull about 20 percent more nitrogen back out of the needles than other conifers can. That preserves a store of an essential nutrient for a new year’s growth. It’s like creating a bank account that can be drawn upon in the future.

Other conifers, with their needles mostly intact, continue photosynthesis all year, though at a lesser rate in winter than in the warmer months. But the tamaracks store enough energy and nutrition so that they can stand bare for the winter without making new food. 

Tamaracks are also well adapted to survive the cold. Without needles they are less susceptible than other trees to leaching of nutrients when soaked by rain or melting snow. All these qualities enable them to thrive not just here in the Upper Midwest but north to the edge of the Canadian tundra.

So from our shoreline I can watch the tamaracks change day by day, from green, to yellow, to gold, a striking display when lit by a low sun. Before long the golden needles fade to brown. 

Suddenly one day they’re gone. 

And then it’s winter. 

Ted Rulseh is a writer, author and lake advocate who lives on Birch Lake in Oneida County. His new book, “Ripple Effects,” has been released by UW Press. You can learn about it by visiting his website at https://thelakeguy.net.