A Tree's Tale: Yankee Daring Do

 

I have a fraught relationship with the trees in my yard.

Click to see Rope

We moved in to a new street in old Hampton, New Hampshire 16 years ago and one of the first things I discovered is that I could not simply take out my pick/axe and dig a hole and plop in a tree.

For one thing, the builder had buried all the electrical wires underground, so we have no street poles or lamps and the gas lines are buried as are the cable wires and the underground watering system. So, the first thing I hit with my pick axe was a water sprinkler head.

After that, I had Dig Safe come out and mark all the spots to avoid which left precious little spots for planting.

Obadiah Youngblood, Pink House Drinkwater Road

The Live Free or Die state, you cannot simply buy and plant a tree because you happen to crave that tree. I had always loved Norway maples, which have these really cool maroon leaves, but the Horticulture Department at the University of New Hampshire did not share my love and got the state to outlaw these trees as "invasive species," which cannot be sold in or transported across the state. Complaining bitterly to my neighbor, he laughed, "Well," he said. "The UNH faculty are called tree huggers.'"

But then, a few weeks later, I got an urgent phone call from this neighbor, "I'm at Home Depot," he said. "They've got three Norway maples. I don't think they know what they're selling. Do you want to get them?"

We drove over in his pick up truck and bought all three and I got two for my back yard and I managed to plant them without hitting anything explosive in my back yard, on the edge of the woods which run up to the yard, woods protected by a watershed law.  

Those trees are my pride and joy and they leaf up every Spring and I love them. I also note that the middle school landscaping includes a long line of Norway Maples, which some how got planted despite the prohibition. In fact, these trees are only ever seen in landscaped areas, never in the woods around town. A pretty tame invasive species.

I also planted a London Plain tree, because I admired how New York City uses them, although I managed to plant it on my neighbor's property, but she just shrugged it off, saying, "It's a pretty enough tree."

But then, there was the blue spruce pine. I loved the blue needles and I managed to find a spot which did not run afoul of wires or gas lines or water lines, right next to the house. In general, I do not like trees near a house, but this was just a little Christmas tree, only in blue green and it was about 6 inches in circumference and about six feet tall. That was 16 years ago. Now, it's about 25 feet tall and it blew over in the high winds we had with the last storm.

It was on its side and I went out to inspect it and to start cutting it up with my bow saw. I was saddened to do it. The trunk at its base is at least 3 feet around and the shape has always been symmetrical and lovely. It was like having to shoot a work horse you'd had around the farm since it was a young colt.

But my neighbor appeared with his huge pickup work truck and said, "I think we can pull her up again."

"Even if we could get it up," I said. "Wouldn't it just fall over again?"

"We had some trees do this in our backyard and we drove in stakes and ran lines to them and they took root and survived."

So we threw a rope around the top and ran the line to one of the Norway maples in the backyard and pulled the spruce upright and it's stayed up for 8 hours so far.

I'm just hoping the rope doesn't cost me my Norway Maple.

But so far, we've got one upright tree and one support tree.