Tree Removed

A box elder tree, showing its age and damaged over the weekend,was cut down today. Sections of the dried and rotten top fall and more would be falling. I informed the city forester late Sunday night and one of his staff came out yesterday. It didn't take too long before he whipped out his yellow spray can and assigned the death mark.  The death messenger told me that since the city crew is so busy he didn't know when the tree would be removed.  He led me to think it would be latter rather than sooner.

This morning while enjoying my breakfast in our backyard I heard the screaming chainsaw. I thought that the city was removing storm damaged trees in front of Ken and Diane's house. Yesterday Ken asked if he could have the orange traffic cones used at the Prospect Gardens.  Ken wanted to clearly mark two iron decorative pillars to the right of the damaged tree. The handsome pillars, no more than five feet tall, graced Diane's Grandfather's house. Another neighbor, David, was using the cones to divert path traffic while installing a council-ring- like structure consisting of several kinds of boulders and a thick slap of black locust. It's part of a butterfly garden that David, his wife and other neighbors developed last summer. The new sitting area is quite specular. I will post pictures when the project is completed.

So after finishing breakfast, I went to fetch the cones which meant going down to the path. To my great surprise, I  noticed the guy in the bucket high up in the old box elder, cutting off the top branches. The crew worked carefully, not stepping on plants and dropped the tree so it did little damage.The tree trunk and branches were gone by 3 o'clock.  A few sun drops near the bottom of the incline were damaged and can be easily replaced.  I will need to move a few hostas further under the remaining trees. The sedges and other plants were all intact.

To some extend I will miss the old tree while being relieved that it is gone. Today was a good reminder that change is constant.