Plant species at the Andrews Forest include enormous Douglas fir trees, which can reach 300 feet tall, and the tiniest mosses. The 505 species recorded include plants with flowers, cones, catkins, and fruits. The full list of plants species can be found on our Species Lists page.
Research from the Andrews Forest suggests that old-growth forests may provide a buffer against rising air temperature.
The Andrews Forest is home to resident birds, such as the Varied Thrush and the the iconic Northern Spotted Owl, which stay all year round. The Forest is also home to migratory birds, such as the Black-Throated Grey Warbler and the Swainson's Thrush, which spend the summer breeding season at the Andrews Forest and fly south for the summer. The full list of birds can be found on our Species List.
The tallest tree on the Andrews Forest, a Douglas Fir, was identified by LIDAR imaging. If you saw the previous version of this Fast Fact, you would have seen that the tallest tree on site was 299 feet, measured in 2008. The height of that tree was verified in 2009 with a measuring tape! This other, now taller tree, was measured by LIDAR in 2016. A cross-section of that LIDAR image is pictured here. As a point of comparison, the Statue of Liberty stands at 305 feet tall, including her base.
Invertebrates, which include insects, spiders, centipedes, and slugs, number more than 3,100 at the Andrews Forest, with the possibility of many more species to be found and documented. See our species lists for a full list of the invertebrate species that have been documented...so far.
Most of the Andrews Forest is covered in dense forest. Huge, iconic Pacific Northwest old-growth conifer forests grow here with cedar, hemlock, and moss-draped ancient Douglas fir trees. See our Forest Description page for more information.
A publication co-authored by a team of Oregon State University, US Forest Service, and US Geological Survey investigators compares quality of interpretation of northern spotted owl habitat based on traditional aerial photographs, Landsat satellite imagery, and recently-available, high-resolution LIDAR data. This team, led by Steve Ackers, head of the Andrews Forest-based spotted owl crew, uses the well-studied Blue River-Andrews Forest area as a test case.