The Idaho Champion Kentucky Coffeetree of Julia Davis Park

The largest Kentucky coffeetree in Idaho grows in a city park that also holds an art museum and a zoo. It stands 74 feet tall with a trunk 328 centimetres round, and it has held the state record since a University of Idaho forester nominated it in 1986. It is an odd thing to be champion of. The species belongs to the Midwest rather than to the high desert, and its name is literal: settlers roasted the seeds as a substitute for coffee. Raw, the seeds and pods are mildly toxic, which is why the seedless cultivars are the ones cities plant today. The register does not record which kind this one is. Everything we know about it comes from one place. The Idaho Big Tree Program printed identical figures in its 2014 and 2019 editions, five years apart: 41 inches through the trunk at chest height, 74 feet tall, 215 points. That is one register republished rather than two sources agreeing, so the entry is flagged. What the repetition does tell us is that nobody struck the tree off in between. Nobody has dated it. The register gives no age for any of its cultivated trees, so the field stays empty rather than filled with a guess. If you know when it went in, tell us. It shares Julia Davis Park with the champion bur oak, which makes the two an easy pair in one walk.