The following article appears in the Spring 2025 newsletter of the Michigan Botanical Society Southeastern Chapter about the Sterling Oak, published June 02, 2025. It is also being republished with permission here.

The Story of the Sterling Oak

Becoming part of the MBS Big Tree Program

submitted by Mark Graf

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In 1799, William Blake wrote to Reverend John Trusler, capturing the profound divide in how people perceive nature:

“The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing which stands in the way… As a man is, so he sees.”

Such a tree stands today in Sterling Heights, Macomb County: a Chinquapin Oak (Quercus muehlenbergii), certified by the Michigan Botanical Society’s Big Tree Program as one of the ten largest of its kind in the state. After centuries of storms, logging, development, and urban sprawl, it now faces removal—deemed simply “in the way.” Alongside it, 13 other landmark-sized trees and six regulated wetlands face the same fate. Their ecological value and historic endurance are overlooked by decision-makers prioritizing an apartment project on publicly owned, protectable land—a stark contrast to the legal challenges often posed by private property. 

Measured by MBS certifiers in December 2024, the tree ranked 7th in the state database. Its recognition—and estimated age dating back before the founding of the U.S.—sparked local media attention and a growing petition, now signed by thousands, to save it. Dubbed “The Sterling Oak,” it’s become a recognized natural landmark with a dedicated website, sterling-oak.org. Yet even this groundswell of support may not be enough to ensure its survival.

MBS expertise proved essential when city officials, after media attention, questioned the tree’s identification. In response, MBS examined the claim —organizing clear evidence from leaves, acorns, and structure to rule out the city’s alternate species and reaffirm the original certification. Today, the healthy oak remains in limbo as permits and financing move forward—without any clear commitment to its preservation.

Doug Tallamy writes in his book The Nature of Oaks, “We cannot casually accept the loss of oaks without also accepting the loss of thousands of other plants and animals that depend on them.”  The losses of keystone species like oaks are not accounted for in the project spreadsheets highlighting tax revenues and guesses of economic activity.   Even relatively strong tree ordinances where landmark trees require more replacements fail to bring ecological science into accounting for the true deficit created.

As a society, it seems we have long accepted ecological losses—often through ignorance or indifference. They rarely appear on any balance sheets. These costs are silently offloaded onto ecosystems and species with little accountability, fueling the biodiversity crisis we now face. When keystone species are lost, the effects ripple outward, yet the scale and frequency of such losses make assigning responsibility nearly impossible.

In 1947, ecologist Aldo Leopold, struggling with this one-sided view of “progress,” wrote, “One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds.” These wounds—paved over, sodded, and forgotten—still surround us. Even then, the Michigan Botanical Society was working to recognize natural heritage through its Big Tree Program, launched in the early 1940s. Leopold suggested that true conservation isn’t possible until we stop viewing land as a commodity and begin to use it with love and respect. The Sterling Oak may become just another paved-over line item in our history of land deals.

The Michigan Big Tree Registry reflects a long-standing labor of love, honoring trees as symbols of strength, endurance, and generational commitment to preservation. Despite pressures—natural or anthropogenic—these living monuments carry legacies worth remembering. May their stories and records endure, even when the trees themselves are deemed “in the way.”