Remember my comments about our house when we arrived home after three months on the road in our motorhome? Something about Sleeping Beauty Castle? Something about how things were a bit overgrown? Something about a dead tree?
Finally these problems are being addressed.
This is (was) the ancient maple growing just behind our house. My Dad (who is a forester) has advised we cut the on-her-last-legs tree down. Dad is probably right, but I just love this maple. She gives us shade, beautiful fall foliage and houses the occasional houseguest. Every year or two, DT hires a tree service to snip and clip this lovely maple.
You must admit - she is a pretty (half dead) tree.
So Cory climbed up the tree. Hooked himself up to safety gear and ropes and proceeded to cut off heavy limbs/dead weight from my beloved shade tree.
Tarzan in our forest.
But in the end, even I thought the tree looked better. (I am so against all this pruning and just want all the trees to grow as G-d intended, but sometimes this is just not the best thing when a tree is attached to a structure.)We also had a dead tree in the front of the house. Why this tree died is a mystery. It was planted on the same day - 16 years ago - with an identical Douglas Fir. Why one tree thrived and the other died will forever be an unanswered question.
Any Oregonian will tell you the tree on the right is sick.
From any angle, no matter how you look at the tree... it is a goner.
One sure sign (did I mention My Dad is a forester, retired from the BLM?) is when a tree sends out a bazillion cones. This is tree-talk for "hello, I am on my last legs, but here are awholelotta babies to carry on my legacy".
It is basically a Last Will & Testament in the Douglas Fir world.
The tree dude, starting at the bottom, cut each branch from the Douglas Fir. The top ten feet of the tree was chain-sawed-off onto our driveway.
Then Cory worked his way down the tree, cutting off 16-18 inch pieces of the trunk. This wood will keep us warm via our fireplace (assuming we are ever home in the winter).
Foot by foot, the sixteen year old tree is reduced to firewood.
Gone.
DT was busy all afternoon moving and splitting firewood.
This photo is lovely, but since it was 90+ degrees, it is really difficult to imagine receiving pleasure from this stack of fire wood.
Next project? The pines in the circular drive. They are growing out of control and reach-out to scratch our motorhome when the Magna Peregrinus makes the rare appearance in our driveway.
Now the trees are trimmed/pruned and look quite sleek.Though things are looking quite a bit better around the house, I still can enjoy nature from other areas on the property. I like things wild and un-pruned... but sometimes things can just get out of control.
I am happy to report that wild plants are thriving outside of the "landscaped" areas on our property. Blooming. Flourishing. These plants don't worry about boundaries. They don't worry about irrigation. They have lived on this property for centuries before we arrived and will thrive for centuries after we are gone.
They don't call this weed plant "Oregon Grape" because it grows in Cleveland.From the street, the casual observer may now notice there is actually a house behind all the foliage.
Next week - more pruning and bark dust.Until my next update, I remain, your groomed correspondent.