The Tanyosho Pine of Kubota Garden

Fujitaro Kubota planted somewhere between fifteen and twenty of these pines along the drive of his garden. This is the only one left. The early aerial photographs show what he made: a row of tanyosho pines, the umbrella-shaped form of the Japanese red pine, lining the drive closely enough to filter the light into a kind of tunnel. Kubota was a Japanese immigrant gardener who founded the garden in 1927, in what is now Rainier Beach. It became a City Historical Landmark in 1981 and a public park in 1987. The pines did not all make it. The city's own tree walk puts it plainly: after many winter storms and a changing climate, only one of the original trees, about ninety years old when that guide was written, is still standing. A handful of replacements have gone in over the past twenty years, so the drive is slowly becoming a row again, with one old tree among the young ones. That old one is the tree worth finding. It stands in the Historic Core Garden near the Heart Bridge, stop eight on the city's Kubota Garden tree walk. Entry is free and the garden is open daily. The pin marks the garden rather than the pine, so bring the tree walk and look for the Heart Bridge.