"Bermuda Cedar" Top 5 Page for this destination Bermuda Favorite Tip by grandmaR

Favorite thing: The cedar is a wonderful aromatic rich looking wood that is endemic to Bermuda. That means it doesn't grow anywhere else. (It's also not really a cedar.) The first shipwrecked mariners used it to rebuild the Deliverance which took them on to Virginia. It is also extensively used for woodwork in places like St. Peters in St. George. There was even a cedar prison in St. George's.

Juniperus Bermudiana is harder and darker than normal cedar, and it repels moths and fleas and to prevent mildew and rot. Settlers not only used it in ship building but also used it to cure toothaches and coughs (in the form of cedarberry syrup), and they boiled cedar brush in water to break fevers.

Fondest memory: Four centuries ago, Bermuda cedars grew throughout the islands, about 500 trees to an acre, according to some reports. But in 1944 Bermuda cedars suffered a tragedy that no one foresaw, when oyster shell scale, a form of fungus, attacked the trees. A year later, another fungus, juniper scale, struck. Ten years later, 90 percent of Bermuda cedars were dead. As many as 75,000 dead cedars were cut down as authorities launched reforestation programs.