Been Working on this Project for 2 Years... Ready to Ask for Help

[dogaround]

I have many pictures of this project, even have one video. I live in a suburb of Washington DC. All these pics were taken in my neighborhood. This tree is in my backyard. We used to call it that weird backwards 4 tree, then I stumbled across some thong tree sites & I began to wonder.

This appears to be a marker tree at least, if not something more. I read that a good place to begin when trying to figure out what the tree is trying to tell you, is to check 20 paces in the direction it is pointing. I used my woodburning "uh, that's a joke" metal detector, and it absolutely pinned at 20 paces. I have a video of that, but don't really know how to post video, & don't want to put it out on YouTube. I dug 5 feet down, and still never found anything. The hole is still there, covered with a tarp. I just can't make myself fill it in, but I have to turn it into a bigger project to go deeper. Then I read, that they, & by they I mean KGC or other white men sometimes used surveyor's math when using these kinds of markers, and that they sometimes would bury their goods or leave another clue a furlong from the first mark. That's 660 feet. I google earthed that in the direction the tree points & luckily for me, it is in a wooded area that still exists... with a creek running through it. That sounded good. So I went down there & searched for the largest tree around, & it was right on the creek bank. It is absolutely loaded with very old carvings. Here are a few. The first couple are most interesting to me. At first, it appeared to be the initials D. S. I There were vines on it, so that was somewhat obscured. But when I cleared them off, It appeared to be some sort of arborglyph.

I've done quite a lot of digging trying to find the meaning of these images... possibly silver, possibly the phases of the moon... I've considered that it might be a message for the underground railroad, since I'm in Va. & near DC. These marks are deeply chiseled into the tree, & I didn't notice the mark above the S till the third time I went down to the tree. It looks different depending on the time of day you go down because of the shadows that are thrown.

This is chiseled on the other side of the tree. It looks like J. D. with another mark. I've searched for that mark & found so many things that it could be, that I don't think its any of them. The really interesting marks are on another part of the tree. I'm very curious about the "7" looking character shown here.

Here are some more curious marks.

I saw one site that suggested the PL seen in this pic may represent a property line. That seems reasonable, but isn't necesarily the case. Here are two more pics that I took near the creek and that are about a block away from this tree. I may post them in the "What is This" section someday, but for now, I'll show them here. I really don't know what the first one is. But it's clearly not something found in nature. The Second, I believe is a grinding table. The way it is worn or ground down looks right, and it has mold in the "grinding spot" I believe that is because there was organic material ground there. All this leads me to believe that there were native Americans living in this area, and that takes me back to my tree. It may be a mark they made to show something... possibly water, hunting, a way home on the trail of tears or maybe a great big treasure.

 

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[desertmoons]

Hi dogaround. Wonderful work you have done so far.

An adventures starts in your own back yard...I wonder how many times you mowed around that tree.. lol.


I do not know much about tree signs at all..sorry..but I agree with you that the tree looks modified. The first rock looks odd indeed.
If native, I do not know its purpose. "What is it" sounds like a good idea.


I believe there is less than handful of people (who post), who have accurate knowledge of trees. So it may be a while for more responses. Some of them do not visit very often.

The initials..well could just be initials...however...
Do folks usually carve all 3 initials with periods around there? I would wonder. The way I look at things such as your v, when all else fails, use the long leg as a directional. I believe old dog posted that about A's...and it seems reasonable to me that it could apply to any linear marking when one is thinking of ideas that might apply. .

Best of luck and thank you for posting. Patience.

Anyone who favors piedmont blues is a ok in my book.
DM

 

[dogaround]

Thanks Kim. Got your pm. I'll try that. This is a weird project because I'm in the middle of the suburbs. But there's a park and a woods right where I need them to be, & I've found two other bent trees in the area. Because of the creek, that area was never built upon. But its a little tricky walking around with the md, a shovel & a camera and trying to stay obscure at the same time. I don't really care, its fun. It turns out that one of the early civil war battles in Va was just about a mile up the road... an attack on the railroad. There were guns and gondolas (if you can believe that) stolen. I've considered that what is pinning my md in the yard could be burried booty from that attack. I didn't intend to dig five feet, but I keep thinking something is in there, I'll just go a bit more. If you hit ctrl + on this page, it'll zoom in. Take a look at that first pic... I really think there's something there. (to get your page back to normal, hit the % sign in the bottom right of your screen)

 

[Bajahunter]

dogaround
The gondolas they are talking about are open topped railroad cars.
The initials look to be relatively recent compared to the age of the tree.
Have you found other trees with initials or carvings?
Are there any other known historical carvings in trees in your area, something you can compare your carvings to.

 

[dogaround]

Here're three more pics. The first shows the D.S.I with the vine on it when I first found it. The second is kind of hard to discern, but there's a carving in the lower right that looks... maybe like a bayonette? I have to admit, I start seeing clues everywhere when I get going with this.

I agree that in the pics, the inits look newer. But up close, you see they are old. One reason I think that is that the tree is leaning towards the creek, and the inits were carved straight on the tree. They're leaning with it. They're deeply chiseled into the tree. I've found one other tree with some carvings on it, & it's a bent tree. I can't tell what it is, but it could be an all seeing eye, which would suggest the masons. There is a very old masonic house in this small town that's in a large metropolis. Here're a couple pics of that tree & the carvings. This tree may have come by its unusual shape by natural means, but it is right at what is now a small concrete tunnel that allows the creek to go under a modern road. I believe the road has been there since the old days.

Here's what is carved on this tree. There's some other stuff on this tree too, but I think I might be reading too much into it. It isn't very deep, and like I said... I start seeing clues everywhere I look when I spend too much time on this.

 

[Bajahunter]

Yes, those initials were carved into the tree when it was straight.
How old is the tree? You can tell with an increment bore.
You can buy one for around $100, or you can find a county or state agency that will do it for you.
I wonder if you are at the site of a Civil War encampment. People with spare time to carve their initials into a tree.
Might be a good place to take a metal detector.

 

[dogaround]

Thanks for the reply bajahunter. Sorry it took so long to get back. I really don't have any money to spend on the project.... I'm one of the longterm unemployeds in the news these days.