For more information on Maine’s Register of Big Trees and to receive a copy of the 2011-12 register when available, write to: Jan Santerre, Big Tree Coordinator, Maine Forest Service, 22 State House Station, Augusta, ME 04333, or call 800-367-0223.

To view the register, visit the Project Canopy website at projectcanopy.maine.gov.

AUGUSTA — Know any really big trees in your neck of the woods?

If so, Jan Ames Santerre, director of the Maine Forest Service‘s Project Canopy in Augusta, would like to hear from you.

Nominations for the 2011-12 Maine Register of Big Trees can be submitted through Dec. 31 to Santerre, Big Tree Coordinator at the Maine Forest Service, 22 State House Station, Augusta, ME 04333; or call 800-367-0223.

“State champion big trees capture our imagination for their size and strength,” she said Wednesday in a report.

“There is more to a champion, however, than just its size,” Santerre said. “They are symbols of all the good work that trees do for the quality of the environment and our quality of life.”

Since 1949, the forest service has been compiling a list of the largest known specimens of native and naturalized trees in the state. The 2009-10 register contains 159 trees, representing 149 species, Santerre said.

“Of these, the (Maine Forest Service) has been notified that four are dead, including the New England Champion American elm located in Yarmouth, known affectionately as ‘Herbie’ and determined to be 217 years old at its demise,” she said.

The forest service, which is under the Maine Department of Conservation, receives 30 to 40 valid Big Tree nominations each year, Santerre said.

“There is quite a bit of competition,” she said. “There are some very big trees on the list. Most of them are true to their species form, which isn’t necessarily true in general.”

Santerre or Forest Service foresters measure Maine’s Big Tree candidates for the register, which is printed in book form and is also available online.

To determine a champion, each tree is given a score based on a formula that adds circumference in inches, height in feet and one-quarter of the crown spread.

In addition to 159 state champions, Maine has two trees that are tops in their species and are listed on the national register, Santerre said.

One is a yellow birch in Wayne, with 343 points. That tree, she said, is 242 inches in circumference, or just under 6½ feet in diameter; 82 feet tall; and has a 74-foot average crown spread.

This tree is on the cover of the 2009-10 Maine Register of Big Trees.

A bigtooth aspen in Appleton is listed on the 2010 national register, Santerre said.

“Its status is questionable, though, as it was showing severe decline in 2008,” she said.

That tree had a total of 275 points, with 169 inches in circumference, 92 feet in height; and a crown spread of 51 feet.

Previously, a white pine in Morrill was the national champion for its species, with 385 points.

However, in the most recent edition of the national register, the state champion was felled from the register by a rival tree located in Cheshire, N.H., that totals 414 points.

“Trees are here longer than we are,” Santerre said. “There is the potential for them to be windows to our own past and gifts for the future. We plant trees for their beauty, as well as their being gifts for the next generation.”

Most of Maine’s champion trees are found in city parks or cemeteries where they have been nurtured for years, Santerre said.

tkarkos@sunjournal.com