Daily Dose Blogger Bios
The Killers Next Door
I am so upset I can't even post a picture. I came home yesterday with a flat of corn starts to plant in my vegetable beds, and as I walked by my ornamental pomegranite (why couldn't the original owner of the house have put in a fruiting one instead? Sigh...) I noticed something was different. It took me a little while to figure out what it was - everything was off, though. Suddenly, I realized that the toyon that hangs over my fence and mingles beautifully with my pomegranite was gone. As in GONE - chopped down! My neighbors are building a fence, and instead of figuring out how to accommodate the beautiful California native tree, they killed it.
Now I know it was their tree, but it was a very important part of what gardeners call my "borrowed view". I even posted about it last year! Is it wrong for me to be hating on my neighbors right now? I know this isn't a big deal to them, what do they care about one tree or another? But they know I loved that tree. Just like they knew I hated the birches they planted in their front yards, feet away from my garden. (She asked me for suggestions on what trees to plant, but I was ignored) Whenever someone comes to look at my plantings, I always have to tell them that the sickly birch is my neighbor's, not mine. Silver birches in Southern California? Please!
I am so frustrated, because I can't hate on them too hard. The reason they are building that fence is to keep their crazy dog from attacking my fence and inciting Sadie and Dexter to riot. I do appreciate that. But there was a way to save that tree. I saved my pomegranite when my fence was built ... it cost a little more, it took some planning and brain power, but it was doable. Now we have a fence that keeps the peace between the dogs, but the lovely native tree with the deep green leaves that covered itself with berries in the winter, and was a source of food and shelter for our neighborhood birds, is nothing but kindling.
I am so, so sad.
Gaaah, that sucks. I'm so sorry, honey--I totally understand how upset you are; I get really attached to specific trees and feel like they're my friends. I'm no treehugger and I know that sometimes a tree does need to come down, but that just sounds sad and wasteful.
*Hugs* I hope you are able to rescue your weekend after that bad start. xoxo
Sweet Kate, thanks for feeling my pain. Today was tough. I'm not a treehugger, either - Sometimes I have to take down trees, but I try hard to find other solutions before chopping. It was so capricious, this action. it shocked me.
When I lost my avocado tree - my Bacon Avocado with the most delicious fruits ever - I cried for 2 weeks. This won't be that bad, but I still weep for the pretty neighbor tree that is no more.
That's terrible! It's so difficult to share a fence line with neighbors who don't get gardening. It's one thing when they aren't interested in it, and quite another when they're proactive about doing the wrong thing.
It's so true, Nestmaker. At this point I think apathy was better. I never thought I'd say that! If they just rigged up a half-hearted attempt at a fence, the beautiful tree would still be there. I feel like a baby, whining about a fence that they are building as an attempt to improve neighborly relations - but how can I not feel sad and befuddled? A big part of my screen is gone, and now I have to re-work a big section of the garden that was pretty much on point.
Sigh. I know I have to suck it up and just deal. I promise I'll just indulge my sorrow just a little longer. Thanks for being a shoulder to cry on!
My condolences on your loss.
During a surprise October storm two years ago, Buffalo lost a good portion of our tree canopy. By good portion, I mean 20% of our trees had to come down and nearly every tree left standing had damage. The mood of the city was morose for months. You'd have thunk the Bills lost another Superbowl. That's how sad we were.
Jim/ArtofGardening.org
A whole city mourning the loss of their trees. I think that needs to be the topic of an epic poem, don't you? The loss of a tree can really hit a person hard - trees are like family. Losing that many trees at once - how devastating...
For some reason when you said that I suddenly thought of the hollow tree in Pippi Longstocking's yard, the one where bottles of lemonade sometimes "grow" in the summer. At the beginning of one of the books (P.L. in the South Seas, maybe?) a guy wants to buy Pippi's house and cut down that tree and the children from next door are inconsolable at the thought.
Why is my brain so packed with children's books? God.
Sad - see this too much around here. Most people don't even know what kind of tree they have and don't care to even research it. Chopping it down is so much easier.
If you have room, why don't you grow a toyon in your garden? They can be kept small if you like. I work at a botanic garden and they are weeds there, they volunteer so much. Don't get me wrong, I love toyon and have one in my home garden. The birds go crazy for the berries. They're real easy to grow, fairly fast, not fussy about soil and mine is in half-day shade, so not fussy about sunlight, although it probably would have grown faster in full sun.