[Rose Pacheco] I am Rose Pacheco. I am a Garden Educator at Cylburn Arboretum. Mainly I was attracted to this beech tree because of the giant wound on it. This tree was, in my opinion, obviously struck by lightning. When a lightning strikes a tree, it strikes at about, it could be upwards of like 50,000 degrees, and that quickly heats any of the liquid or sap in a tree, and they literally explode. So, one thing about trees is the way that they heal, it takes years and years sometimes. And this was obviously a huge wound that killed the whole heartwood of the tree almost. And it's already rolled over on the edges, so that means that it's been healing for a really long time. In the forest here in Baltimore, the beech trees are usually an understory tree. So they're a lot smaller. Looking at this one, though, you can tell it's more of a hub tree or a mother tree in the forest. This is probably one of the biggest trees around, so it was probably pretty big and tall at one point, and perfect for a lightning strike. Beech trees are really smooth, gray barked; humans have been writing on beech trees since we've known about them. Actually beech means ‘book.’  So people would peel the bark off, it's very smooth, like pages in a book. They'd write their hopes and dreams, and then they'd bury it and hope that their dreams came true.

This black-and-white etching, approximately eight and one-quarter inches high and six inches wide, depicts the wide, gnarled trunk of a beech tree, likely split and scarred by a lightning strike. The tree’s roots and trunk are shown up close and cropped, so very little of the tree’s canopy and twisting branches can be seen above it. Considered a portrait of a tree due to the amount of detail included by the artist, the image focuses on where the trunk has split open. Despite being damaged, the edges of the wound are curled over, suggesting it has been healing for a long time.