Latest column - Trees

Take my Trees…Please!
By Tim King

The headline came to me while writing this article and I had to do some research to make sure that I was using it in the correct context. Many of you may (and many more may not) remember the famous line from comedian and violinist Henny Youngman. “Take my wife…please.”

I was relieved to learn that Henny and his wife were actually very close and were married for more than sixty years…the origin of the joke was an honest misunderstanding by a theater usher. Mr. Youngman only wanted his wife to be escorted to her seat first, but the usher found the line tremendously funny, when taken literally.

You see, I have a love/hate relationship with the trees in my yard. Let’s just say, I know why our section of town is called Pine Point! Between the hazy clouds of dusty pollen that coats everything in sight and has us scrambling for Benadryl in the spring, the sap that stains our vehicles all summer and the needles and cones that ruin the PH balance of my lawn, it’s safe to say that pines are not one of my favorite arbores.

Then again, oaks are not much better.

The oak trees in my yard are constantly shedding their deadwood branches all over my yard. In the fall, my vehicles are bombarded with thousands of golf ball size acorns and the clean white winter landscape is muddied by their late falling leaves, later to be revealed as a clumpy, soggy mess come spring.

Don’t even get me started about the riotous band of squirrels that may come for the acorns, but clearly stay for the much tastier seeds found in my birdfeeder.

All summer long the voracious roots of these overbearing neighbors suck up all the water from my lawn and block the rain and sun from reaching the ground, leaving patches of grass stunted and brown. They are forever tossing their buds, leaves, bugs and branches into my pool and prematurely darkening my deck of the already much too short summer sunshine.

In a few more weeks the work will really begin. Day after day, leaves and needles, cones and acorns will tumble from the trees and need to mulched or hauled away. It will start as a dainty flutter as the nights turn cooler, but will undoubtedly end in a deluge of tree debris covering every inch of my property.

You may be asking why I simply don’t move, where is the love…or even why I would have chosen to live where I do in the first place? Clearly my life would be simpler, maybe even happier, without all of these troublesome trees cluttering my landscape. On the surface, this is true, but I recently came to realize something that has helped me gain a better perspective.

Simply, they were here first.

This past spring, I had an arborist give me an estimate for thinning out the deadwood in the oaks and remove a few of the scrub pines whose growth will always be stunted by the much larger oaks. While we were walking, he mentioned that the age of oaks was probably around 30-40 years old. “At least the second growth, the original trees probably started here more than 100 years ago.”

I was amazed to learn that these monsters were actually second-generation oak trees. I had no idea. What tipped off the arborist were the three main shoots that came out of the ground and stretched to the sky. Each one more than a foot in diameter. “The original tree was as wide as all three of these shoots combined,” he said as I imagined a single trunk, more than five feet across! There is one such stump in my neighborhood. Counting its rings, I found more than 80.

Since that day last spring, I have found myself being more respectful of these proud sentries of my yard. Year after year, they have protected the house against the heat of the sun, the cold wind of countless nor’easters and more sleet, rain and snow than I have seen in my entire life. Actually, more than anyone I know…except maybe my wife’s 102 year old grandfather.

What has impressed me most was the shear determination they have shown over the years. They’ve survived harsh storms, drought and disease… even been completely cut down, only to grow strong and true once again.

Somehow, this makes it a little easier to deal with the mess, hard work and aggravation that comes with sharing my small piece of the world with a few trees. It also reminds me of the importance and limitless potential that can be found by developing a strong set of roots.

Tim King is a freelance writer who sees the forest and the trees from his home in Scarborough. He can be reached at - sylvan.sauntering@gmail.com